According to latest data released by the market research agency Cerved, a total of 8,120 companies went out of business in the first half of this year, which was a 10.5-percent rise compared to the same period in 2013.
SHAFAQNA–More companies are going bankrupt in recession-hit Italy as their underlying financial problems continue to fester due to weak economic activity, worsening credit conditions and rising unemployment in the country, Press TV reports.
Moreover, bankruptcies in Italy soared in the second quarter of 2014, showing a 14.3-percent increase in comparison with the same period last year.
In total, more than 500,000 small and medium companies have gone bankrupt since 2008.
“The new recession Italy has recently slipped in is pushing many of those companies that had successfully overcome the first phase of the crisis out of the market. They are now paying the price of both the credit crunch and poor demand that has been stagnant for too long,” Cerved Communication Manager Guido Romano told Press TV.
The remarks come as the signs of economic growth look bleak in Italy, and the number of financially related suicides increases in the country.
Thousands of men, whose businesses have failed due to the precarious economic situation in Italy, have taken their lives in a gesture of extreme desperation.
According to a human rights report, the suicide rate in Italy jumped by 40 percent in the first three months of 2013 compared with the same period in the preceding year.
“The truth is that the Italian media have been deliberately ignoring the issue. They hardly refer to these suicides as financially motivated. I personally consider these victims as… heroes of today,” saidGiuseppe Bortolussi, a member of the Italian General Confederation of Artisan Firms (CGIA).
According to Italy’s National Bureau of Statistics, ISTAT, around 10 million Italians or 17 percent of the total population reside in relative poverty, and six million or 10 percent live well below the poverty line.
Successive Italian governments have reportedly not been able to provide the reforms required to restore the people’s growth and confidence.
Source: Press TV
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