To turn to modern Italy, we can see that the factors that once encouraged its economic development have now become problems. Low-tech products - once a mainstay - can now be manufactured more cheaply in developing countries where technological development has reached a level comparable to that of Italy thirty years ago and where labour costs are much lower.
Italy's future can only be guaranteed by offering products that such countries cannot match. But this requires an efficient instrument able to manage the throughput of information from universities and research centres to industry and thus stimulate more innovative production.
Although Italy possesses the right kind of infrastructure it must be admitted that it has yet to develop such an instrument, known to some as a "scientific park", and already a reality in other industrialized countries.
Ferrara can boast its Consorzio Ferrara-Ricerche, an embryonic scientific park run by the private sector and untrammelled by bureaucratic hindrances.
Largely funded by its own activities, the Consorzio uses efficient low-cost systems ("incubators") aimed at stimulating entrepreneurs to generate new businesses. A country with Italy's strong industrial structure and considerable research potential would be foolish to ignore such systems.