Report: Nearly 30 percent Italians at risk of poverty

http://www.presstv.com/detail/2013/12/19/340907/report-nearly-30-percent-italians-at-risk-of-poverty/

Poverty is on the rise in Italy. The new alarming figures recently released by the Italian Bureau of Statistics ISTAT show that almost 30 per cent of people living in Italy were suffering or risked suffering poverty and social exclusion.

 

ISTAT said that the number of people in serious economic hardship amounted to 14.5 per cent of the population last year, almost two percentage points more compared to 2011 and 5 per cent higher than the European average. A recent study by agricultural workers’ organization Coldiretti has found that over the past five years the poverty rate in Italy has almost doubled, leaving nearly one in 10 Italians unable to afford the basics such as food and healthcare. According to Coldiretti today almost 5 million Italians live in absolute poverty, around eight percent of the country’s population.

An increasing number of deprived Italians often cannot afford to heat their homes properly or eat meat as Italy continues to struggle to overcome its worst recession since WW2 and soaring unemployment.