Some 30,000 small firms in Italy are
at risk of falling prey to usury and loan sharks, retail group
Confcommercio said Wednesday.
It said the thousands of small businesses were "at a high risk
of usury and other criminal events".
The actual number is somewhere between 26,000 and 44,000,
Confcommercio said.
The data were presented on the ninth national day of "Legality,
We Like It!".
Confcommercio President Carlo Sangalli said "usury is widespread
but it emerges with difficulty".
He said "it is a crime that feeds on silence", appealing to
victims to speak out and report their loan sharks.
"We must not leave businessmen on their own," he said.
Sangalli added that the COVID-19 pandemic and the Ukraine war
had been "further detonators for usury".
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