The Acait of Tricase (LE, Puglia, Italy): an agricultural cooperative for tobacco production. Surveys and conservation status

Francesco Giuri, Angela Calia, Ivan Ferrari, Antonio Monte, Giovanni Quarta, Emilia Vasanelli

Abstract

The tobacco industry in Puglia has been for about a century the main economic resource for the farmers and the dealers. The first processing with Levantine tobacco began in Terra d Otranto (the current provinces of Lecce, Brindisi and Taranto) between the late XIX and early XX centuries and were linked to the Agricultural Consortium of the Capo di Leuca territory (from 1938 Acait - Società Cooperativa Agricola Industriale del Capo di Leuca). Acait was the first cooperative agricultural consortium of the Terra d Otranto born in Tricase (Lecce, Italy) in December 1902. The Consortium began processing tobacco in 1904 and after a long and troubled history was put into liquidation in November 1995. In 2003 the municipality of Tricase acquired the historic factory, considered a monument of the industrial heritage of southern Italy, as a peculiar economic, social and human testimony of the territory. The paper illustrates the results of an ongoing study on the production site, which combines historical and archival research, an architectural survey campaign and a series of diagnostic analyses on the state of conservation, aimed at evaluating the main forms of alteration of the historic factory.

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IMEKO-MetroArchaeo-2023-190.pdf

DOI

10.21014/tc4-ARC-2023.190

IMEKO TC

TC4 - Measurement of Electrical Quantities

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