At 14:12 PM on Saturday, December 19, the call for applications for the City of Naples's shopping bonus, a financial support measure aimed at families experiencing significant hardship due to the Covid-XNUMX pandemic, closed.
"From the initial surveys, 46.316 requests were received, corresponding to the same number of households," explained Mayor Luigi de Magistris, Deputy Mayor Enrico Panini, and Councilor for Social Policies Monica Buonanno. "If we statistically assign an average of four members to each household," they added, "this means that the shopping vouchers will cover more than 4 people, 185% of the city's total population. This is a large segment of the population, represented by those living without any income or, in some cases, by support for recipients of the Citizen's Income with large families." According to the analysis of the data, 20% of applicants used the CAF service, 9% preferred to use the platform with a personal email address; 91% of applicants fall into the 27.8 to 36 age bracket, and 45% fall into the 26.6 to 46 age bracket.
"A first reading," the mayor and councilors commented, "once again paints a picture of our city's reality, compressed by the economic and social fallout of Covid, which has brought already weakened areas to their knees.
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"We moved quickly," they conclude, "to immediately give the city a breath of fresh air, with the desire to allow all those excluded from other support measures to continue shopping and supporting their families, especially as the Christmas holidays approach. This year has taken a heavy toll on all of us—on the economy, on jobs, on welfare systems: we want the most vulnerable citizens of Naples to be able to spend a peaceful Christmas despite the ongoing emergency."
The municipalities receiving the most requests are Municipality 2 (Avvocata, Montecalvario, Mercato, Pendino, Porto, San Giuseppe), Municipality 3 (Stella, San Carlo all'Arena), and Municipality 6 (Ponticelli, Barra, San Giovanni a Teduccio), followed by Municipalities 4 (San Lorenzo, Vicaria, Poggioreale, Zona industriale), 7 (Miano, Secondigliano, San Pietro a Patierno), and 8 (Piscinola, Marianella, Chiaiano, Scampia). "In fact," the mayor and councilors explain, "even in this case, the statistics do not betray the socioeconomic analyses we conduct daily by listening to people, walking the streets, traversing the avenues, squares, and stairways of our city." Fifty percent of foreign applicants come from Sri Lanka, followed by a significant percentage gap from Ukraine, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. "This could mean," de Magistris, Panini, and Buonanno emphasize, "that approximately 50 Sri Lankan citizens in our city do not have a regular employment contract or any form of income support. However, it remains to be determined, as with everyone else, whether or not they are eligible for citizen's income. We are now awaiting the final results of the checks for a proper overall analysis."
