Insular Italy

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Insular Italy
"A picture showing Insular Italy highlighted in red in a political map of Italy."
Regional statistics
Composition Sardinia Sardinia
Sicily Sicily
Area
 - Total
49,801 km2 (19,228 sq mi)
Population
 - Total

 - Density
6,725,772[1] (2010 est.) 135/km2 (349.8/sq mi)
Largest city Palermo (pop. 656,009)
GDP €117.7 billion (2008)[2]

Insular Italy (Italian: Italia insulare or just Isole) is one of the five official statistical regions of Italy used by the National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT), a first level NUTS region and a European Parliament constituency. Insular Italy encompasses two of the country's 20 regions:

Geography

Insular Italy occupies one-sixth of the national territory in surface area. Territorially, both Sicily and Sardinia include several minor islands and archipelagoes administratively dependent on the mother islands.

Sicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean (25,708 km2) and one of the largest of Europe, while Sardinia is only slightly less extensive (24,090 km2). The lowlands are generally limited in the geographic region and generally appear as narrow coastal belts. The only exceptions are the Campidano and Nurra in Sardinia and the Plain of Catania in Sicily that extend 1200 km2 and 430 km2 respectively. The rest of the area is prevalently hilly, with hills occupying 70% of the territory. Sicily is home to Mount Etna, Italy's highest non-Alpine peak and Europe's largest active volcano. Sardinia is home to the Gennargentu mountain range.

Demographics

The population of Insular Italy totals a combined 6.7 million residents. Insular Italy has a population density of less than half the national average due to the scarce population of Sardinia, one of the least densely populated regions of Italy; Sicily, meanwhile, has a population density five times higher than Sardinia, however, the average results in Insular Italy having a low population density. Their combined populations total just one-tenth of the national population making Insular Italy the least populated macro-region of the country.

The following is a list of cities with a population of greater than 100,000 residents.

City Population Region
Palermo 654,735 Sicily
Catania 292,036 Sicily
Messina 241,807 Sicily
Cagliari 156,560 Sardinia
Sassari 130,656 Sardinia
Siracusa 123,408 Sicily

Socio-economic situation

The unemployment rate of Sicily is the highest in the country at 11.9%, while in Sardinia between 2006-07 it dropped for the first time below 10%, reaching 8.6%, the lowest of all the Mezzogiorno regions, excluding Molise and Abruzzo. The low level of entrepreneurship in Sicily is tied to the local organized criminal activity, while in Sardinia it results from operating expenses (electricity, transportation, etc.) 20-50% higher than other regions due to its peripheral location from the Italian mainland: this handicap, in Sardinia, has been reduced with the development of information technologies, like Tiscali, low-cost carrier, like Ryanair, and the "territorial continuity" (continuità territoriale) legislation about fares and routes between the islands and mainland Italy.

See also

References

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  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

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