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The chater contributes to a book which explores how, to what extent and with what consequences the international crisis of 2007-2008 and the recession which followed have affected European SMEs (small and medium enterprises) in both the well established market economies of the old member countries and in the post-transformation new member countries, and what can be done at the institutional and political level to uphold them. In particular, the chapter focuses on the resilience of Italian industrial districts.

Several recent studies have investigated the relationship between the geographic concentration of production and vertical integration, based on the hypothesis that the spatial agglomeration of firms in the same industry facilitates input procurement, thereby reducing the degree of vertical integration. This article contributes to this debate in two ways: first, we focus on interindustry vertical integration, and second, we consider the effects on vertical integration of unrelated and vertically related variety at the local level. The latter was measured using information from input-output tables and captured the opportunities for outsourcing within the local system. A data set of 24,663 Italian business groups in 2001 was used to estimate Tobit models to investigate the influence of vertically related variety and other agglomeration forces on the degree of vertical integration of groups. We found that vertical integration is influenced by industry specialization at the local level and that higher vertically related variety reduces the need for firms to integrate activities, since they have more opportunities to acquire intermediate goods and services within the local system. We analyze the manufacturing and different macroareas and show that this relationship is also influenced by technology and differences in the organization of economic activities at the local level.

In this article, using a large sample of Italian manufacturing firms, we estimate a structural model of research, innovation, productivity and export performance augmented to take account for the role played by spatial agglomeration externalities. This model, which is an 'augmented' version of Crépon et al. (Econ Innov New Technol 7(2):115-158, 1998) model, comprises five main equations. The first two identify the factors underlying the decision and intensity of Research and Development (R&D) investments; the third links R&D capital to innovation output; the fourth focuses on Total Factor Productivity (TFP) as determined by innovation; the fifth relates TFP to export performance. Our estimates show the significant role played by local externalities in these processes. In particular, related variety and urbanization positively affect the creation of new ideas through R&D, while specialization impacts on TFP to complement innovation output. Finally, urbanization economies support TFP in driving firms' export performance.

This paper aims at analysing the impact of environmentally oriented innovative strategies on firms' economic performance in terms of employment, turnover and labour productivity growth. We exploit a unique dataset of 773 Italian service firms with 20 or more employees, based on 1993-1995 Community Innovation Survey (CIS) II data on innovation strategies and 1995-1998 System of the Enterprise Account (SEA). Using a Gibrat-like empirical model, our findings show a negative link between environmental motivations and growth in employment and turnover in the short term, which then associates to a not significant or even negative effect on labour productivity growth, a result which is explainable by various factors: non-mature markets; early movers that need more time to grasp the benefits of innovative actions; weaknesses of some service branches. The effect on employment is in part compatible with the existing evidence and may be based on efficiency improvements (dematerialisation processes), which also impact on efficiency by reducing workforce numbers. The effect on turnover of environmental innovation strategy is negative, implying either a short-medium effect, possibly balanced in the long run by net benefits in terms of higher added value, or a real negative impact, which may be contingent on the period of observation, when environmental strategies where not at the heart of strategic management policies. Neither Porter-like effects nor virtuous circles among environmentally strategies and performance seem to be present, at least in the short run and for services firms, calling for the necessity of further analyses on medium- long-term effects and performances of specific service branches. Though effects on performances could turn out positive in the long run when mature green markets and investments provide their benefits, our evidence highlights that services could still find hard times in tackling the well-known low productivity 'disease' even in the environmental realm.

The frequency of atopic dermatitis in Italian children and its relationship with selected variables were analysed in a large survey of skin health conducted in Italy. In 1997 we conducted a survey on schoolchildren aged 12–17 years from 13 areas of northern, central and southern Italy. For the present analyses, 3179 Caucasian children (1618 males, 1561 females) were considered. A diagnosis of atopic dermatitis was reported in 224 cases (7.0%). The frequency of reported atopic dermatitis was significantly higher in children with asthma (rate ratio (RR) 4.5; 95% confidence interval (CI) 3.1–6.5). The lifetime prevalence of a diagnosis of atopic dermatitis was higher among schoolchildren reporting a diagnosis of psoriasis (RR 5.5, 95% CI 3.0–10.1) and vitiligo (RR 16.1, 95% CI 6.5–39.5). This study gives estimates of the lifetime prevalence of atopic dermatitis in adolescents in Italy and emphasizes the direct association between the condition and other immune-related skin diseases.

In this book the authors show that any useful investigation of organization and strategies of firms needs to take the business group as the basic unit of analysis. This premise underpins their analysis of the impact of two structural variables - spatial agglomeration and technology - on firm strategy and organization. Via a new dataset on Italian business groups, specific insighits into the formulation of diversification strategies, location choices made and variances in vertical integration are provided.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the effects that technological knowledge spillovers at different spatial levels (that is, local, national, and international), have had on labor productivity dynamics in the manufacturing industries in European regions between 1980 and 1992. In particular, adopting a modified version of a 'catching-up' equation and using an enlarged version of Eurostat's REGIO database, we empirically assess whether these spatial dimensions are possible explanatory factors for the labor productivity growth of firms located in European regions. We examine eventual trade-offs between local (regarding the transfer of 'tacit' knowledge) and global (regarding the diffusion of fully 'codified' knowledge) pressures as possible determinants of the growth in manufacturing productivity at regional level in Europe between 1980 and 1992.

(Advanced On-line Access publication 8th August 2005)