Overview
Sardinia is the second largest Mediterranean island with an area of over 24.090 square kilometres. It's about 270 Km North to South, and 150 Km East to West. Compared with the other Mediterranean islands, Sardinia is by far the farther away from the mainland: 190 km to the Italian mainland and 180 km to Tunisia. However its neighbouring island Corsica, it's only 16 km away.
Inhabitants
Sardinia belongs to the lowest population area of Europe. Only 1.644.000 inhabitants live in Sardinia, of whom 400.000 in the island capital of Cagliari and surrounding areas. The second largest city is Sassari with 120.000 people, then Alghero about 37.000, Nuoro about 36.000, Carbonia about 33.000, Iglesias about 30.000 and Oristano about 29.000.
Language
Italian became the official language of Sardinia and the rest of the country only in the beginning of the 18th Century.Even today the native language of Sardinians in many mountain regions and villages is still Sardo. Where most inhabitants grow up as bi-lingual, and Italian often represents their first foreign language. On the other hand, in the larger towns and particularly in the cities, few only speak Sardo and slowly disappearing, that's why it's now been introduced officially at some schools as a second language. The Sardo language formed around an antique Roman language to many different dialects and variants. You can speak of mainly four different Sardinian dialects: Sassarese, Gallurese, Logudorese and Campidanese. And in vocabulary and sounds it resembles Latin and Spanish. Alghero however is an interesting exception, because the inhabitants still speak a medieval version of Catalan. In the tourist resorts the most common foreign languages are English and French.
Politics
Sardinia is since 28 February 1948 an autonomous region of Italy. The island is divided into eight provinces: Cagliari, Carbonia-Iglesias, Medio Campidano, Nuoro, Ogliastra, Oristano, Olbia-Tempio and Sassari. All very different in culture and language.
Economics
Sardinian economics is mainly farming in the form of cattle breeding (sheep, goats, pigs) and agriculture. Important resources are also the production of wine, olive oil and cheese, and the cultivation of lemons and oranges. Furthermore fishing is an important industry in coastal regions like Tortoli, Sant´Antioco, Carloforte, Cabras, Cagliari and Alghero. Nationally supported projects, which should offer investor possibilities of settling industries on the island had an only moderate and temporally limited success. Like the extraction of raw material and minerals that slowly ended in the mining industry after the big waves of last century. However the gold mine of Furtei in the province of Cagliari, which was opened by an Australian society, as well as the steel factory of Portovesme and the oil refineries of Sarroch and Capoterra are still operating. In addition cork and Sardinian granite factories still represent other great sources of income. Today however the slowly growing tourism industry is an important sector of the economy for the island.
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