A month-long trial stay is Italy’s latest bet against rural depopulation

Ingria, Ronco Canavese and Valprato Soana hope a temporary trial stay will be the start of a longer connection to their valley. Instead of asking people to move immediately from the city, the villages’ new VIHTA program offers a trial period to experience mountain life, including both its advantages and its drawbacks.

The project offers free accommodation and coworking space for two to four weeks between September 20 and October 18, 2026, to professionals, families, academics and university students. Participants are asked to take part in community activities and meet local residents while deciding whether the Soana Valley, in Piedmont, could become a permanent home.

Hundreds of villages across Italy have been searching for ways to reverse population decline, with some introducing affordable housing initiatives and others investing in childcare, infrastructure and connectivity to attract young people. But experts say attracting people to a village takes more than scenic surroundings — successful revitalisation also depends on transport, healthcare, schools, internet access and jobs.

The villages sit near Gran Paradiso National Park, Italy’s first national park, where roughly 8,300 people live in the surrounding municipalities but only about 300 remain inside the park itself, underscoring the scale of the depopulation challenge VIHTA is trying to address.