Tire problem of womenin southern Italy was to be seen within the the economy. context,of tho eaonomic problems of the south in general. end laws had been enaated to give them preferential treatment. She said that Italy had not ratified XL0 Convention No. 156 aonaerniag Workers with Family Responsibilities, pending harmonisation among EEC member States. 74. Referring to artiale 12, she said that information and prevention campaigns were being carried out by family counselling centres. Statiatiaa ,ahowed that abortion had decreesed over the past five years, but recently .there had also beeu a eharp drop in the birth rate so that Italy wea aurrently -;;tbe country with the lowest birth rate in Europe? The_ abortion pill RIJ466 was --being teated in 6ome selected clinios. 75. ‘Turning to article 13, she stated that womenwere discriminated againat in sports by not being allowed to partioipate in all disciplines and by having leas social security coverage then men, ,1: f - m-m-76, Regarding article 14, she said that during the Fascist regime, Italy had ---been mainly a rural society. The major migration of male workers in the 19506 _- ~~~had led to the so-called “feminixstion” of agriculture aa women carried on the ~~~~-.farming business, In recent years, women had participated in rural ::~~:=cooperativea, evenin leadership positions. 71. On article 16, she noted that Law No. 161 of 1975 had abolished the ~~~.~~~~~iformer, deeply rooted concept of the aubmiaaion~of~women end provided for the -,_ .equal rights and equal duties of both apouasa. In case of dispute, each of ~the spouaes could request the intervention of a judge. Both spouses were ~~ expected to aontribute to the maintenance of the family according to their 7 ~~~~--respective reaourcea and working capacities. Whereas before the amendment of ,the Family Code, the woman, on marriage, had had to take her husband’s name, the new law allowed a married woman to add the family name of her husband to Children were put under the control of their parents 1 -her own family name. hunti they had reached the age of majority. In the case of a dispute between ,the parents, a judge had to pronounce on the most appropriate measures to be taken. The provision that gave the father of the child sole responsibility in case of 18imMedixte danger of serious harm to the ahild” was being studied . -.aloadly by the. National, Commission. It was’ thought that that provision %equirsd modif ication. In the case of divorce, she said that the judgement ~-~~~~would~teke effeat more rapidly then had been the case in the past. The amount .of alimony was determined by the personal end material aontributions of both spouses to,the family budget, the common property end their earnings. Alimony ;had to .be~.paid as-long aa the other partner did not have adequate meena end could-not acquire them for objeative reason6 , and had to take into account the rest of living. The emendment to the Family Code had included the concept of $eco~gnixing th& contribution -of womento the family enterprise. 7. 170: : The representative said tbet the country was trying to achieve-cultural absnge tbrough networking end the decentralixation of the work of the National Comruiseion, which would lea&to a stronger involvement of women in all aectora. i,’ 79.. Members commended the-frank end excellent replies of the representative. rhey welcomed the progress that had been made in the field of women’s literaay, -They observed, however, that women in Italy had still not aahieved I-full..equality and that stereotyped attitudes ramained. They said that -16-