
Stunning mountain village in hols hotspot offers families £90,000 to move in… but no one is taking up the offer
The idyllic town, renowned for its breathtaking mountain ranges, is trying to combat its declining population and crumbling infrastructure.
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Located in the northern region of Italy, Trentino has made the enticing offer in an attempt to revamp the village.
Local authorities launched a new housing initiative which hopes to give some 33 towns a much-needed population boost and makeover.
The desperate scheme offered buyers a grant of £90,000 - nearly £70,000 given for renovation, while the remaining cash was provided to purchase a derelict property.
Those who took the cash would have to commit to living at the home or renting it out for at least 10 years.
Not doing so would result in the grant having to be repaid in full.
Applications were be accepted in rounds lasting three to four months each, with the first opening in May.
When the initiative closed in late June - its had received just 291 applications.
But one town, Sagron Mis, failed to attract even one applicant.
Nestled at the foot of the Dolomites, Sagron Mis is a sleepy commune made up of two villages, Sagron and Mis.
It is known for jaw-dropping views - and boasts many cracking hikes and lookout spots.
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The town does, however, come with some challenges, despite its many appeals.
For starters, it has just one shop to serve its population of 170 residents.
Access to other essential services is limited.
Its mayor, Marco Depaoli, said: "We have the post office, the cooperative.
"But we are lacking in the presence of a general practitioner."
The mayor remains optimistic, and said: "It's not a drama. It takes patience. There is no deadline, it is not a rejection of the town."
He also said that there was strong interest in his town, even though there were no applications made to live there for cash.
"Fifteen people have contacted our municipal offices to ask what the rule is, how it works, how to proceed to obtain funding," he explained.
Trentino authorities have allocated over an eyewatering £8.6million to the initiative since it launched last year.
The scheme covers municipalities in areas like Val di Non, Val di Sole, Primiero, Valsugana, and others.
Both Italian nationals and foreign residents can apply.
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The Sun
an hour ago
- The Sun
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BBC News
2 hours ago
- BBC News
Italy's undercover pizza detectives
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Founded in 1984, this organisation exists to "promote and protect" an exacting vision of the city's most famous culinary marvel, and was instrumental in inscribing "the art" of Neapolitan pizza-making as a Unesco Intangible Culture Heritage of Humanity several years ago. From its humble origins as a Neapolitan street food in the late 1800s pizza has become one of the world's most beloved, ubiquitous dishes. Though there are two traditional types of Neapolitan pizza (the Margherita, topped with tomato sauce, mozzarella and fresh basil; and the marinara, which uses oregano and garlic instead of basil and doesn't contain cheese) myriad contemporary varieties have popped up worldwide in recent decades – from slices dressed with blue cheese and honey to the creamy, lemon peel-topped Crisommola del Vesuvio by chef Franco Pepe. But just as there are strict criteria for determining "authentic" Champagne or Parmigiano cheese, this group of culinary custodians has set out to ensure that the delectable dish stays true to its Neapolitan roots – at least if you're going to call it "real" pizza. "There is a big connection between this kind of food and the soul of Naples," says Massimo Di Porzio, vice president at the AVPN, who is flecked with flour in his corporate profile photo. With its training school, competitions, trade fairs and a large bronze pizza statue shining just outside its headquarters the AVPN has become a veritable empire of pizza authenticity. Its lengthy guidelines dictate that all certified pies must consist of a "roundish seasoned disc" with a high-border, puffy crust (cornicione) no taller than 1-2cm. There should be no "big bubbles" or "burned spots". Pizzas must be "soft", "elastic" and foldable. Pizza-makers can't use a rolling pin or baking tray. Cooking a pizza for longer than 90 seconds is sacrilegious. And the final product must be consumed within 10 minutes after emerging from the oven. On the blistering-hot final day of the AVPN's rigorous monthly training course, the international students will put their newfound pizza knowledge to the test. Attendees have studied dough-leavening techniques and hydration, the ins and outs of yeast, the nuances of picking fresh toppings and ideal salt-to-water ratios. They've practiced the intricacies of placing pizza into ovens – a simple-seeming but deceptively tricky step – all with the goal of baking a consistently perfect pie. "I was quite nervous, especially as people started coming back from their exams," says Gemma Eldridge, a Canadian pizza-maker. "But you're really only there for three minutes. You don't really have time to be nervous." From 10:00 to 18:00 during the nine-day course, Eldridge and her fellow pizzaioli baked as many as 40 practice pies each day. Today, students pick at their rehearsal Margheritas as they await the return of the other trainees from their exams, under the scrutiny of local pizza celebrities Gino Sorbillo and Paolo Surace. The chefs are being judged on an undisputed classic: the Margherita. While the pizzaioli refine their technical know-how through this intensive programme, the course is only their first step towards pizza mastery. The real work begins with maintaining these standards in pizzerias back home – an ongoing test that will continue throughout the rest of their careers, should they one day work in accredited Neapolitan pizza restaurants. While pizza-chef training is available to anyone, the bar is higher for restaurants to get accredited. Pizzerias must first employ an AVPN-trained pizzaiolo. They then have to fill out reams of forms in which they swear to "accept, respect and promote the tradition of the Neapolitan pizza". They must photograph their kitchen, equipment and ingredients, as well as take videos of their head pizza chef preparing dough and making and cooking a pizza. This is all sent off to the AVPN headquarters in Naples with no guarantee of approval. To date, roughly 1,000 pizzerias from Japan to Siberia and Ecuador to the UK have signed up to be part of this elite pizza club and, once accredited, can display their AVPN certificate bearing a striped figure wielding a baking peel, all together forming a global network of pizzerias where travellers know they can get the real deal. Still, a restaurant's scrutiny isn't over once it's accredited, as the AVPN intermittently dispatches secret pizza agents on espionage missions to clandestinely spy on the restaurants. Any pizzeria found non-compliant with the group's standards by these quality-control spies risks de-listing. According to one such agent, who cannot be named: "The most serious error I found was a pizza that was crispy and with dough that was definitely not approved." The Association verified the problem and then promptly removed this restaurant from its list of pizzerias. In Japan, a pizzeria that was kicked out of the organisation – but continued to display its certificate – learned of the consequences the hard way. "We went to Osaka and removed it," laughs Di Porzio, recalling the lawyer accompanying the pizza enforcers. This mission to define authentic pizza has a curious side effect, says Karima Mover-Nocchi, a food historian at the University of Siena, who suggests the whole process is as much about myth-making as it is maintaining traditional like this:• A chef's guide to the best pizza in Naples• How to make pizza like a Neapolitan master• Italy's beloved 'fried pizza' By codifying "authentic" pizza, she says the AVPN creates an "inner circle" of true-pizza certificate holders. In short: all the exclusivity gets people salivating over pizza more. "The AVPN aren't just preserving a tradition, they're producing it," she says. "[The AVPN is elevating pizza] into a transcendental experience. They're safeguarding the dish, but also creating a mystique – and you're made to feel like you're part of something that's enduring." Still, given the high drama of these top-secret cloak-and-dagger pizza investigations, it's ironic that such fussy standards to maintain "traditional" Neapolitan pies haven't always existed. According to Di Porzio, centuries ago, Naples' artisanal pizza-makers each had differing techniques, usually passed down from father to son. But in the late 20th Century, faced with a groundswell of shoddy fast-food simulacra that offered fake-Neapolitan pizza, AVPN founder Antonio Pace – who is from a long lineage of pizzaioli – gathered 16 other pizza-making families to standardise what makes an "authentic" pie. There were bumps along the way for the "17 families", as they are known. A major row erupted over the finer details of dough fermentation, but the initial guidelines were published in 1984 and the AVPN was formed. In 1998, the organisation teamed up with the nearby Università Parthenope di Napoli to study pizza science, cutting-edge baking technology and the broader impact of the food, co-creating the Socio-Economic Observatory of Neapolitan Pizza. A yearly conference of top pizza-makers debate whether new findings, such as improvements to flour manufacturing, necessitate a rejigging of the regulations. But for all this precision and protectiveness over pizza napoletana, Antonio Puzzi, the editor-in-chief of the magazine Pizza e Pasta Italiana, notes that Italy has dozens of different types of pizzas. There's Neapolitan pizza fritta(deep-fried calzone), but also Roman pizza, which is crispier and crunchier than the Neapolitan style and rolled with a pin rather than hand-stretched. Then there's pizza nel ruoto (pizza baked in a pan), cooked in a small baking tin; the hot and crispy deep-fried pizzonta from Abruzzo; and a long list of variations on focaccias and flatbreads. "There are a lot of recognised kinds of pizza in many cities and many states," says Puzzi. "But the only official representation is for Neapolitan pizza." Even with Italy's many pizza varieties, certain faux pas – such as ordering a chicken pizza overseas – remain just as likely to invoke the wrath of Italian purists. Case in point: after trying in vain to open 880 shops in Italy, US pizza brand Domino's famously filed for bankruptcy in the bel paese in 2022 – and never dared to open a branch in Naples. Yet, some argue that Italian tastes arechanging, and despite the AVPN's seeming rigidity, they now seem to be more amenable to modifying their exacting standards than they were in the past. "If we can improve something, we'll change it, so we are very open," says Di Porzio. In 2024, Sorbillo, one of the AVPN's examiners and accredited restaurateurs, controversially debuted a Neapolitan pizza with Hawaiian-style toppings. While critics such as Puzzi describe the pizza as a "provocation" – and employees of the eponymous Naples restaurant Gino e Toto Sorbillo all but refused to serve it to me – Sorbillo believes there's room for both modernity and tradition. "Pizza does not stop at a certain point – it's always developing, changing, cooperating with the Association, there is always something to learn," he says. "The pizza of today is not the same as 40 years ago." Yet times do change, acknowledges Di Porzio, who says the AVPN faced a "lot of criticism" for accepting in 2013 that Neapolitan pizza could be cooked in electric ovens as well as the traditional wooden receptacles. The decision rankled the most hardcore traditionalists, says Di Porzio. Still, even as trends and styles shift and previously taboo toppings become de rigueur, Di Porzio and the AVPN believe it's important to maintain traditional cooking methods too. "I always say, pizza napoletana is not necessarily the best, but the pizza that has its strongest roots in the culture," says Di Porzio. "So it's a skill that we need to teach and preserve." -- For more Travel stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook and Instagram.


Daily Mail
5 hours ago
- Daily Mail
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