MILITARY AMMUNITION RESTORATION AND RECOVERY FACILITY – NOCETO DI PARMA

The Military Ammunition Restoration and Recovery Facility of Noceto originated from a plant established between 1934 and 1938 for the assembly of ammunition of various calibres. Despite its recent establishment, the events of the Second World War immediately tested the Facility’s capabilities and adaptability.

Following an explosion in 1940 that destroyed the Projectile Loading Laboratory in Piacenza, activities were transferred to its detached section in Noceto, which from that moment assumed full administrative autonomy under the direction of officers of the Artillery Technical Service. The Facility was consequently renamed the Projectile Loading Laboratory.

The war would once again profoundly affect the establishment. Following aerial bombings after the proclamation of the Armistice on 8 September 1943, the Facility was severely damaged. As a result, the plant’s management was transferred to Trento, while only a residual administrative office remained in Noceto.

Normal operations gradually resumed in the immediate post-war period, when the Facility reinstated its institutional functions as a Detached Section of the Projectile Loading Laboratory of Baiano di Spoleto.

During the 1970s, significant automation initiatives were implemented, including surface finishing processes for artillery shells. That period also saw the construction of approximately one hundred buildings, largely dedicated to the packaging of explosives.

Despite the restored efficiency of production lines and finished products, the evolution of public military production led to a new conception of Defence industrial structures. The Facility consequently lost its direct production role and was transformed into a maintenance and logistical support entity for the Army.

Having assumed responsibility for quality control of ordnance, it also took on the role of contracting authority for ammunition production, which was increasingly entrusted to private industry.

In the 1980s, the Facility became the Advanced Maintenance Centre for HAWK missile systems of the Italian Army and NATO member countries, while continuing to maintain the infrastructure dedicated to conventional artillery ammunition processing.

With the restructuring of the Defence Technical-Industrial Area in the late 1990s, and in response to the evolving needs of the Armed Forces, the Facility embarked on a path aimed at opening to the civilian market, thereby assuming a role markedly different from its previous institutional function.

A decisive milestone in this transformation was the transfer of the Facility under the authority of the Defence Industries Agency in 2002, with the objective of achieving sound and economically sustainable management.