Italy
Facts
Population:
The population of the country is approximately 56,735,130 (July 1999
est.)
Location:
Southern Europe, a peninsula extending into the central Mediterranean
Sea, northeast of Tunisia
Climate:
predominantly Mediterranean; Alpine in far north; hot, dry in south
History:
While Italy's status as a single political entity is relatively recent
(1861), its strategic Mediterranean position made it a target for colonisers
and opportunists fairly early on in human history. The Etruscans were
the first people to rule the peninsula, arriving somewhere between the
12th and 8th century BC. They were eventually subsumed within the mighty
Roman Empire, leaving little cultural evidence, other than the odd tomb.
The ancient Greeks, their contemporaries, set up a few colonies along
the southern coast that became known as Magna Graecia and developed
into independent city states. Thus the greater glory that was Rome was
itself the offspring of Etruscan and Greek cultures.
Economy:
Since World War II, the Italian economy has changed from one based on
agriculture into a ranking industrial economy, with approximately the
same total and per capita output as France and the UK. This basically
capitalistic economy is still divided into a developed industrial north,
dominated by private companies, and a less developed agricultural south,
with large public enterprises and more than 20% unemployment. Most raw
materials needed by industry and over 75% of energy requirements must
be imported. In the second half of 1992, Rome became unsettled by the
prospect of not qualifying to participate in EU plans for economic and
monetary union later in the decade; thus, it finally began to address
its huge fiscal imbalances. Subsequently, the government has adopted
fairly stringent budgets, abandoned its inflationary wage indexation
system, and started to scale back its generous social welfare programs,
including pension and health care benefits. In December 1998, Italy
adopted a budget compliant with the requirements of the European Monetary
Union (EMU); representatives of government, labor, and employers agreed
to an update of the 1993 "social pact," which has been widely credited
with having brought Italy's inflation into conformity with EMU requirements.
In 1999, Italy must adjust to the loss of an independent monetary policy,
which it has used quite liberally in the past to help cope with external
shocks.
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FACTS
