Milan Expo Site to be Transformed into Technology Park and Research Center

Although the World Expo of 2015 ended in October, the Milan Expo Site is not expected to crumble into oblivion. On November 10th, just ten days after the closing of the World Expo, Prime Minister Matteo Renzi announced that by the end of June 2016, plans for “Human Technopole: Italia 2040,” a technology park and research institute dedicated to genomics and big data research, can begin taking place of the Expo site.

The research center aims to explore the Expo’s themes of food and agriculture, but also ideas such as technology and discoveries, welfare systems in aging societies, sustainable innovation, and the protection of national cultural heritage.

“We need to start straightaway to give sense to our mission – to ensure that this doesn’t become an area of regret,” Renzi stated, according to ansa.it. The one million square meter center will employ up to 1,600 researchers and students.

The Italian government is ready to pour 150 million euros into the park each year for the next ten years. The park is also receiving 100 million euros each year from the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa, which has proposed a plan for the technology park and is preparing the guidelines for the center. But for now The University of Milan is still the main force behind the project and plans to invest an initial amount of 450-500 million euros. It intends to move all of its scientific departments besides medicine to the former Expo site, occupying 200,000 square meters with its own buildings and 16,000 students.

Renzi also hopes that the site can boost Italy’s international credibility and reflect continuing reforms such as the government’s approach to unemployment, a feat that the country has heavily struggled with during the past decade. The Expo remains both a regional and international  success, and the site should continue to benefit humanity as a whole.

– Marisa Wherry