The Enhancement of the Alta Valsesia Territorial Potential: A Collaboration-Based Approach Between Academia and Local Actors

Over the past decade, efforts have been made to enhance the development of Italian fragile areas, to counter social exclusion and population decline. With this purpose, the National Strategy for Inner Areas was launched in 2014, to face the challenges related to the improvement of territorial services. In the wider context of research on the issues of vulnerability and marginalization, the Branding4Resilience-B4R project defined local strategies for revitalizing inner territories and fostering partnerships and collaboration between Academia and local actors. This article describes how the Politecnico di Torino B4R Research Unit has activated a collaboration-based approach with Valsesia Mountain Union since 2020, contextually with the B4R start, and how it has supported the current SNAI strategy definition process. It emphasizes the importance of collaboration in generating insights and proposing initiatives to boost competitiveness and territorial appeal. The results show how the proposed approach supported the sharing of opportunities and threats related to the territorial context, some design ideas deriving from a collaborative process and how the ongoing interaction between Academia and local actors can trigger possible actions connected with uncertainties and risks, based on a data-driven process and not only deriving from political decisions.