On the Economic Crisis in the Adige Valley and River Regulation

From South Tyrol, early January. In Tyrol's best periods, the Adige region was known as the most fertile, healthy, and prosperous part of the land. From ancient times, this name referred to that beautiful valley through which the Adige flows from Meran to Deutschmetz; previously, up to the confluence of the Avisio stream, it was called the Etsch quarter. In olden days there was the designation: 'the land on the Adige and in the mountains'; the Teutonic Order still maintains a 'Bailiwick on the Adige and in the Mountains.'

Yet that stretch of this historically renowned valley, reaching below Neumarkt and Tramin on the right and left of the Adige River down to the old German boundary post near Mezzotedesco, has over recent decades fallen deeply from its former fortune and prosperity into destitution and misery; anyone who saw the flourishing Salurn fifty or more years ago would no longer recognize it today. The same is true of Margreid, Tramin, Neumarkt, and other towns in this area.

Whence such a transformation? The simple answer is: from the Adige and from the wine tariff.

Owing to forestry neglected for centuries and forest devastation that has gotten out of hand in recent times, with mountain debris carried into its bed, as well as faulty river and bank construction and the unnatural confluence of several mountain torrents, especially the Noce, the Adige River has reached a significantly elevated water level. Every spring, every summer thunderstorm, and many sustainedly damp autumns raise the Adige to an excessive level; the water masses breach or overflow the weak banks and levees, bury the lower-lying lands, destroy the first or second crop, turn the soil into swamp, and poison the air.

The consequences of these conditions, which have worsened over decades, are increasing infertility of fields, vineyards, and meadows, the impoverishment of the inhabitants, miasmas, and swamp diseases.

Under the weight of these afflictions, nothing remains for the inhabitants but to free themselves first of all from the excessive burden that the former favorable state of viticulture and the high value of real estate have placed upon landowners' shoulders in the form of a high land tax.

Reference is made primarily to the parcels situated on the valley floor, through the midst of which the Adige courses downward, diminishing or altogether destroying their yields and ruining their soil through groundwater.

In the municipality of Salurn, this includes the area of the Porzengraben association on the right and left banks; its taxable ground amounts to 1,350,903 square fathoms with an assessed tax capital of 166,790 fl. 55 kr. This capital has to pay an approximate annual tax quota of 2,000 fl. In the years 1840, 1842, 1844, and 1849, the floods of the Adige incurred expenditures of ten to thirteen thousand gulden each time to restore the destroyed bank fortifications; in addition, ordinary maintenance works cost an average of six thousand gulden every year. Since the resources of the taxpayers were at times exhausted by meeting such heavy expenses, several debt obligations gradually arose, totaling at least 20,000 fl., the redemption of which requires 2,000 fl. annually over a ten-year span. Accordingly, the dues from the above taxable area of roughly 1,380 Joch of land amount annually to more than 16,600 fl., for which fifty (!) tax collection terms are required. In ten years these taxes reach 166,600 fl., or roughly the entire aforementioned tax capital of the total area! Where could an equivalent land-tax burden be found? And how could a landowner, who besides princely and municipal taxes must pay fifty tax terms annually—that is, roughly one-tenth of the property's value—survive on an estate that yields zero harvest in at least eight out of ten years!

Yet even granting the fortunate occurrence of a good vintage, what then? The grower cannot recover from it, even if it recurred more frequently, because he can almost never process his grape yield (Praschlet or crushed mash) into wine himself, lacking the necessary vessels and the ability to hold out. Consequently, he forfeits the vintner's actual profit and rarely receives more than 3 fl. 30 kr. at the 25 fl. standard for an Yhre, that is, for 50–60 Maas. Three Yhren of Praschlet produce about two Yhren of wine, sold at 5 fl. 15 kr. per Yhre. This insignificant price of wine compared to former times, when an Yhre never stood below 15 fl., stems from the steep tariff that burdens Tyrolean wines not only upon export abroad, but also into other parts of the crown land under the name of 'Umgeld' (surcharge) as an oppressive consumption excise, confining them to local production areas where they lose value day by day.

It is plain that under such conditions the municipalities in South Tyrol grow poorer every year, that they gradually become incapable of paying their contributions, and must press for tax relief, as occurred recently in the municipality of Salurn. Yet this will not achieve the proper remedy against these hardships; relief can lie only in a comprehensive regulation of the Adige, carried out swiftly at state expense according to Pasetti's design, and in the abolition or appropriate reduction of the wine tariff so that a lively trade in this native product is enabled and fostered. This two-fold measure is far more favorable to us South Tyrolean landowners than any newly projected commuted obligations, whereby contrary to legal principle a few would receive a more apparent than genuine relief at the expense of the whole.

A benevolent voice was recently raised in the 'Südtirolische Zeitung' and met with a willing echo in other papers under the catchphrase 'Noce diversion.' It described truthfully and openly—for it was a German voice—the urgent necessity and the blessing of vigorously carrying out a proper regulation system on the Adige and its mountain torrents, recognized as indispensable for a century, which can be brought to life only through the decisive removal of opposing tendencies between German and Italian Tyrol.

Soon, very soon, this well-meaning call was met by an outcry from Wälschmetz; it was raised by no patriotic heart, but arose from selfish perspectives and an unneighborly attitude. We shall not dwell here on this challenge; we appeal to the impartial judgment of the province and to the government's declarations in favor of the Adige and Noce construction works. To be sure, the new organization of the crown land's construction authorities may seem to some likely to arouse anxieties regarding the Adige valley and its river works, particularly since the excellent construction director Kink was withdrawn from the province. Yet we firmly trust in the unshakeable consistency of the Pasetti plan, in the supreme resolution by which this plan was sanctioned for execution, and in the ministerial orders for its prompt and irrevocable implementation. This trust will safeguard us against the agitations from Wälschmetz and further upstream; authorities in Vienna will be convinced that the inhabitants of the Adige valley are worthy of the assistance they so sorely need.

Postscript. Issue number 5 of the 'Messaggiere Tirolese' has just come to our attention, containing the reply of Section Councillor Pasetti from Vienna to the article in the 'Tiroler Bote' of 24 December 1849 concerning the Noce diversion. We rejoice sincerely that the author of that article succeeded in securing such a semi-official assurance for the good cause, albeit with stern sidelong glances at his bold phrasing. The entire Adige valley finds great reassurance in Herr Pasetti's promise that the ministry will not waver in the slightest from its intention to carry out the Noce diversion energetically and completely, that it will deploy all possible means, and that within a short time it will erect a monument of His Majesty's solicitude and affection for the inhabitants of these regions; all well-disposed parties will gladly abandon exaggerated demands and exert their utmost strength to advance the vital enterprise, since the Section Councillor provides the satisfactory declaration that contributing to this great work is a duty grounded in existing benevolent statutes, which must therefore be fulfilled even by those who have hitherto opposed the Noce diversion.

This favorable outcome consoles us over all malicious disparagement, all the more so as we have also learned that Chief Engineer Menapace, who oversees the Noce diversion, and his staff have, by a recent order of the Imperial-Royal Supreme Construction Directorate in Vienna, been removed from the influence of the provincial construction authority in Innsbruck and placed directly under the aforesaid Supreme Directorate.

This is viewed as an effective means for the rapid pursuit of the enterprise, and it calms concerns over the unexpected, heavily Italian-tinted organization of our provincial building authorities.

If we are not mistaken in this assumption, any occasion for further warnings in the interest of the Noce diversion will fall away in the future.