#Coronavirus: Fipe’s cry of alarm

Thousands of events, public and private anniversaries, initiatives of all kinds that are reformulated, postponed or cancelled every day. To this must be added the collapse of tourist presence in our country and the application of measures that are difficult to understand, which greatly reduce the operations of our companies. Not to mention the measure requiring the total closure of entertainment venues. 50 million euro cancelled every day, make Italian public establishments the sector most affected by the effects of the Coronavirus. 72.7% of our associates believe that the crisis will last for a long time to come, with a worsening in the next two months with sharp falls in turnover, with peaks of up to 80%. A first estimate calculates the sector's turnover losses in three months at €4 billion, worth around €1.5 billion in terms of added value. Collapse of mobility and sociality are the combination that is compromising, throughout the country, the survival of many companies, which is contrasted so far by the lack of useful measures to accompany the seriousness of the moment.

 

"We are crying out loud - declares Lino Enrico Stoppani, President of Fipe Confcommercio - for the support of the Institutions and to do it soon, with concrete signals of support to the enterprises, which otherwise will close. We ask for urgent interventions on social shock absorbers, tax credit mechanisms to make up at least part of the collapse in turnover, the suspension of the payment of charges and taxes, the suspension of evictions for delinquency, to meet the needs of those who in the coming weeks will not be able to honor the lease contracts and pay suppliers and employees. It is not difficult to understand that without receipts you cannot even honour your debts. Unfortunately and inexplicably, the measures taken to date do not concern companies in the main tourism sector, the catering industry - traditional, commercial and collective -, catering, entertainment and Bars/Pubs. We also call for clarity on the application of the rules. We find it incomprehensible that bars in Lombardy, Veneto and Emilia Romagna cannot serve customers at the counter. If the objective, which is absolutely sharable, is to avoid crowds, it would be enough to adopt the precautionary measures suggested by the health authorities for every other service, from the grocery store to the post office. We are responsible, but it is not clear why you get infected in a bar if you have a coffee at the counter, respecting the distance of one meter, and not in a line in the subway or in other similar situations allowed".

 

"We are waiting urgently - continues Stoppani - for concrete measures from the government, there is no more time to lose, we will not be willing to accept further discrimination against a sector that employs more than one million people and that risks leaving more than 40,000 people at home because it is impossible to pay them. We need to hurry because the health emergency risks blowing up the counter and if they close our activities, they close the lights that animate the cities and we lose a heritage of sociality and service, a symbol of the Italian lifestyle and a decisive factor in attracting tourists".