Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has always insisted she is not a climate change denier and that her rightwing government is committed to greener sources of energy. But her coalition is putting the brakes on the rollout of solar panels on farmland, which Meloni has described as a “threat to our food sovereignty” — a claim refuted by some farmers and solar energy experts. The government last month issued an emergency decree banning ground-mounted solar panels from land zoned for agriculture.
In the southern region of Basilicata, 61-year old Emanuele Bocchicchio said that at present he left about half of his land fallow because of increasingly hot weather, drought and rising cultivation costs. Last year, Bocchicchio agreed to lease out 44 hectares of his unused land to Terrawatt, which plans to build two 10MW solar plants for which he would receive annual rental income of €3,000 per hectare once the project is approved.