A three-week bike and boat field trip by 153 university students and their professors to give a complete checkup to Italy's mighty but ailing Po River ended on Friday here at the river's delta on the Adriatic.
The delta was the focus of the last 50-km stage of the trip and participants agreed it was the most fascinating.
"The delta is one of Italy's greatest natural spectacles," observed Carlo Petrini, the creator of the Slow Food movement and founder of the University of Gastronomic Sciences (UGS), which sent its students on the field river adventure.
"This was an amazing journey and I'm sure everyone involved will always remember it," he added
The 24-stage trip, entitled In Search of the Great River, began at the river's source near Monviso, in northwest Italy, and covered 650km through four regions and 13 provinces.
"The message we sent with this initiative is that this is a river which must be saved. Not only from an environmental point of view, but also an historic-cultural one. We met many people during this trip who are trying to do just that and they need support," Petrini said.
The aim of the project, explained UGC Chancellor, Alberto Capatti, was to "focus on how the Po was and how it is now. This to draw up a comprehensive report not only on the river's weaknesses but also its strengths, which can serve as the basis for a new future".
The ambitious field trip, he explained, was aimed at "enriching our students' cultural background. These experts in food and wine were offered an opportunity to understand the complexity of the landscape, from an historic and geographical perspective".
"It was also a collective investigation into the gastronomic culture of the Great River," Capatti added.
Over the past three weeks, students attended daily classes, seminars and conferences on subjects related to Italy's longest river.
Members of the river's community - including fishermen, blue-collar workers and scholars - also took part in the project to help the students understand how the river works and to examine its health and potential resources.
Aside from exercising their abilities to organize, research and learn from the locals, students also had an opportunity to discover the area's history, foods and culinary traditions.
This led to the drawing up of a list of 500 foods and food products which must be saved.
POLLUTION PROBLEMS FOR PO RIVER.
A scientific study by experts from four universities made earlier this year found that on a scale of one to five the water of the Po River stood at two.
The study said that while the waters of the river were relatively clean, high pollution levels were found in the silt layers, especially in the delta area on the Adriatic.
Most of the river's pollution, 52%, came from industry, 33% from farming and livestock raising and 15% from domestic sources.
According to the experts who drew up the report, the greatest threat to the river came from farming and livestock raising because they were the most difficult to control.
While water discharged into the river from industry and urban areas can be treated, the experts explained, in agriculture farm lands are fertilised with pollutants which then wash off into the river or sink into water tables.
The Po River basin has a population of 16 million people and produces 40% of the nation's GDP and accounts for 46% of the labor force.
The basin also hosts 55% of Italy's livestock farms and 35% of the country's working farms.
PO RISKS RUNNING DRY BEFORE REACHING DELTA.
If current climate trends continue, the Po risks running dry some 100km before reaching its delta on the Adriatic Sea, experts warned in a recent report.
This will result in salt water rising up the river, upsetting the environmental balance and making traditional forms of agriculture impossible.
The report concluded that the Po is a "river in crisis" because reduced rain and snowfall has lowered the amount of water feeding the river, while higher temperatures have increased evaporation and forced farmers to draw more water from the river to irrigate their crops.
According to Italy's Environment Protection Agency (APAT), the level of the Po has fallen 20-25% in the last 30 years.
APAT said that around 73% of the water drawn from the Po is for agriculture, while drinking water accounts for 11% of the extracted water, hydroelectric-energy plants 9% and industry 7%.
