Rethinking urban health in productive habitats: a One Health approach perspective

Urban planning in the twentieth century has expressed as one of its main objectives its concern for the health of cities. With the advent of the hygiene movement and the decentralization of industry, new urban models and rationalities came into practice, especially concerning industrial areas. Among these, we can identify the company towns that industrialists funded using their financial resources to attract inhabitants-workers by offering them better and safer living conditions (Porteous, 1970).1 These towns offered the individual the privilege of hygiene (Foucault, 1976; Cowie, 2011) and sought the well-being of the human being, while attention to environmental issues and the care of other living species assumed a secondary role.2,3 This article aims to reflect on productive habitats and their habitability, to provide a historical reading of the urban processes and industrial decisions that marked these territories, according to a One Health perspective.3 To this scope, the paper examines the company town of Dalmine, founded by a company operating in the steel sector in the province of Bergamo (Italy). Through the analysis of company archives and the collection of testimonies from company managers and directors, the study discusses the role of the industry in promoting urban health, from its implementation in 1906 to the present day. Whereas previously, between the 1920s and 1960s, the company engaged in building public health works, e.g., heliotherapy and cryotherapy colonies, food cooperatives, milk factories, outpatient clinics, and other facilities to improve human health, today the company has integrated environmental challenges into its decision-making strategies. Emphasis is placed on the industrial policy of reducing CO2 emissions and the pioneering choice to become the first Italian steel company to use green hydrogen to decarbonize the steel sector. The example of Dalmine reflects the need to conceive the health of productive habitats through an integrated ecosystem approach to guarantee the livability of space, the health of species, and sustainable development.