Expo Osaka: Abruzzo Region Week inaugurated at the Italian Pavilion

The inauguration ceremony of the week of protagonism of the Abruzzo Region took place today at the Italian Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka, represented for the occasion by a delegation led by the president Marcus Marsilius, from the Councilor for Productive Activities, Tiziana Magnacca, and by the Undersecretary with responsibility for Tourism Daniel D’Amario. From today to June 21, Abruzzo presents itself to Japan and the world with its own space that reproduces the typical Abruzzo village, open to regional businesses and institutions. Through participation in Expo, the region aims to attract new investments in the territory by highlighting the reliability of the regional system, and to tell its traditions, strength and potential, with an emphasis on excellence such as high-quality craftsmanship, agri-food, but also the automotive and aerospace sectors.

This is “a unique opportunity for businesses, to consolidate the internationalization process that the Abruzzo Region and the Chieti-Pescara Chamber of Commerce have been pursuing for some time”, based on a strategy “that considers the Asian market, with Japan as its point of reference, central to the growth and development process of Abruzzo companies from craftsmanship to agri-food to tourism”, as stated by Councilor Magnacca. The busy schedule of the Abruzzo week at Expo has already started today, with the conference “Design between tradition and innovation. Cultural heritage, craftsmanship and sustainability between Italy and Japan”, curated by the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Chieti, and with a cultural event dedicated to the eminent historical figures of Alessandro Valignano, Raffaele Ulisse Barbolani and Gabriele D’Annunzio, curated by the Japan-Abruzzo Association.

“The Universal Exposition is always an occasion in which the whole world comes together. Everyone must show off their own specialties. For us, this is a precious opportunity: as Italy and as Abruzzo, we boast excellence and unique specialties in the world that we can show and thanks to which we can fascinate the guests who are visiting our pavilion by the thousands right now”, said the president of the region, Marco Marsilio, during the inauguration ceremony. As Abruzzo, “we are showcasing our typical craftsmanship, our applied scientific research, the goals we have achieved in many disciplines and sectors, and last but not least, the beauty of our land, which no one can copy or transport elsewhere and which must be discovered in person. Our goal is precisely this: to fascinate the Japanese and Asian public in order to strengthen the bonds of cultural, tourist, social, food and wine and industrial collaboration”. In Abruzzo, the president of the region underlined, “there is already a lot of Japan, just as in Japan there is a lot of Abruzzo. We will further consolidate this bond during these days”.

In fact, Abruzzo boasts a strong historical and cultural bond with Japan: as recalled by Andrea Marin, director of the Italian Pavilion at Expo 2025 Osaka, it was the famous Jesuit missionary Alessandro Valignano, evangelizer of Japan, the idea of sending to Europe and Italy the first Japanese diplomatic mission led by Ito Mancio, historical figure who has become a bit of a “spiritual guide” of the narration that the Italian Pavilion is offering in these months at the Expo. Another illustrious Abruzzese, Gabriele D’Annunzio, he is the most read Italian writer in Japan after Dante Alighieri. Today, the link between Abruzzo and Japan is demonstrated above all by the important and massive presence of Japanese industry in the region, with large companies such as Honda, Denso and Pilkington (NSG Group) that will also be protagonists of the Abruzzo week at Expo. “Today, the main declination of the cooperation between Abruzzo and Japan is certainly the industrial one”, confirmed Marsilio, recalling the extraordinary importance of the Honda industrial hub in Val di Sangro, the main production center of small-displacement motorcycles in Europe. Japanese companies “are a cornerstone of the metalworking industrial chain and in particular of the automotive sector”, which produces up to half of exports and a significant share of the regional GDP. Abruzzo, Marsilio underlined, is today the first region in Italy for the production of motor vehicles.

“We know how sensitive the Japanese authorities and institutions are to the top-level relationship between our two countries, and from this point of view I am certain that we will continue along this path to strengthen the determination of the Japanese industries and government to invest in their future development in our region,” said Marsilio. The opportunity offered by the Osaka Universal Exposition “is precious to tell the story of an Abruzzo that is opening up even more to the world, that is building an extension of its airport runway and that from this year has an airport where airport taxes are not paid, opening up prospects for intercontinental connections, hopefully also with Japan.” The organization of the Abruzzo presence in Osaka has already contributed to strengthening the collaboration between the region and the Chamber of Commerce. Gennaro Strever, president of the chamber of commerce, spoke in recent days of a fruitful agreement, and announced that “in September, thanks to the trips at the beginning of the year to Japan with Phenomena and Foodex, the top management of Jtd, the largest Japanese tour operator that moves over 20 million tourists in Europe, will be in Abruzzo for an educational tour”.

Abruzzo, concluded Marsilio, wanted to make the most of the spaces offered by the Italian Pavilion to make them meeting places with the Japanese companies that already operate in Abruzzo, and those that are interested in establishing a presence there”. The Abruzzo week at Expo includes conferences and moments of study and B2B “to tie up the threads of a long journey and show how much harmony there is over time. Japan is one of the few places in the world where an Italian can be amazed by what he sees. It is a mutual fascination, a harmony between peoples and cultures that finds expression through the common trait of beauty”.

The ambassador Mario Vattani, General Commissioner of Italy for Expo 2025 Osaka, reiterated today the strategic choice of making the regions protagonists at the Italian Pavilion. “We are now two months away from the start of this operation that has given us a platform with very high visibility not only in Japan, but throughout Asia. This is in fact an Asian Expo, which looks to regional markets that are very important for the future development of our businesses”. Vattani recalled the long-standing human and cultural relationship that links Japan to Abruzzo, protagonists of a dialogue that addresses issues such as “resilience, imagination, creativity, also enriched by common challenges such as the seismic vulnerability of the respective territories, and embodied by works such as the Aquila Temporary Concert Hall” by the famous architect Shigeru Ban: one of Japan’s contributions to the reconstruction of the Abruzzo territories hit by the 2009 earthquake.

“The elegance and style of the story prepared by Abruzzo here at the Italian Pavilion will be successful for its variety and depth, as well as the coexistence of culture, tradition, roots and high technology, digitalization, virtuality that unites the narration of Abruzzo with that of the Italian Pavilion,” said Vattani, underlining that the region is the protagonist of the pavilion also by virtue of its centrality in the Italian aerospace sector: the exhibition of the Italian Pavilion set up with the Italian Space Agency (ASI) “in fact also speaks of Abruzzo” and its aerospace district (DAAB).

The Abruzzo week at Expo 2025 Osaka comes at an important time for the Italian Pavilion, which yesterday celebrated its first two months of activity with record numbers, confirming its role as a strategic outpost for growth diplomacy in Asia. In just two months, the Italian Pavilion hosted 79 economic events, 70 B2B meetings and 134 cultural events, involving over 250 economic entities for 3.320 participants in the economic events. There were 2.500 representatives of Italian, Japanese and foreign companies, with 68 visiting delegations (more than one per day): of these, 34 business delegations (20 Italian and 14 Japanese) and 34 institutional and cultural delegations, of which 17 Italian, 9 Japanese and 8 international. The Auditorium, the centre of the conference activity of the Italian Pavilion, welcomed 2.100 participants. Protagonists of Italian, Japanese and international civil, economic and cultural society have discussed together various subjects, the same ones that constitute the privileged reference object of the so-called “Italy-Japan Action Plan 2024-2027”: this strategic document is the development axis along which all the promotional and updating activity of Italy’s image at Expo 2025 in Osaka is determined.