History
In the 1970s Gioia Tauro had to be the main centre for industrial development in Southern Italy, following a burst of violence in Reggio Calabria in 1970, signaling frustration over neglect by the central government of the region. The construction of a large steel plant and port facility was meant to bring income and jobs to Calabria. Until then Gioia Tauro had been a productive and beautiful agricultural area. Profitable farms and olive groves were expropriated and demolished.
The 'Ndrangheta, a Mafia-type criminal organisation based in Calabria, and in particular the Piromalli clan, exploited the construction of the steelworks until the project was abandoned in 1979 when the crisis in the steel industry could no longer be ignored and the government decided there was no economic base for it. In the meantime some 1,000 people were killed in conflicts over construction contracts. For a while the homicide rate of Gioia Tauro, with a population of about 17,000 at the time, was higher than New York City.
Then it was the turn of the energy project, but the great electrical energy power station was never built, due to environmental problems. Gioia Tauro became a grand example of failure which characterized much of the development of Italy’s South as "industrialisation without development."
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