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Post-Covid economic recovery in sharp focus at Cibus Forum
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Tuesday, 22 September, 2020, 15 : 00 PM [IST]
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Parma, Italy
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The agreement between the components of the agri-food supply chain on how to tackle the post-Covid economic recovery starts from Parma. The leaders of the food industry, the large retail sector, and agriculture met at Cibus Forum, and started a dialogue with the government, represented by Luigi Di Maio, minister of foreign affairs, attending in person in Parma. The event was opened with welcoming remarks by Gian Domenico Auricchio, president of Fiere di Parma, by Federico Pizzarotti, mayor of Parma, and by Stefano Bonaccini, governor of the Emilia Romagna Region.
Ivano Vacondio, president of Federalimentare, said,“The food industry, which proved to be of fundamental importance during the period of emergency, can still operate as an economic driver and return quickly to its pre-crisis levels. This strength, however, must not be mistaken for a state of wellbeing. 2020 is also a black year for the food and beverage sector, which absolutely needs the government's support in order to recover quickly. I am referring in particular to grants for the HoReCa sector, which must be much more substantial than those allocated in August, and which are indispensable for reviving the food service sector. With this support, I feel sure that by the end of next year the food industry will once again be the driving force of the Italian economy.”
In his speech, Di Maio confirmed the commitment of the minister of foreign affairs and international cooperation, with its entire foreign network, to supporting the agrifood sector, he said,“We want to transform every Embassy in the world into an enterprise house, because Italy and our companies must grow and export our products of excellence everywhere. We have set up many initiatives, starting with the relaunch of the trade fair sector, which can now rely on a digital platform - Fiera 365 - available to operators. In addition, we have created an extraordinary physical and virtual incoming programme for welcoming to our country buyers, influencers, journalists and other key players for the relaunch of the Made in Italy brand in the world, starting from the agri-food sector, which represents one of our country’s best known and appreciated points of excellence.”
The necessary collaboration between the different segments of the agri-food sectors was also emphasised by Giorgio Santambrogio, past president of Associazione Distribuzione Moderna and managing director of the VèGè group, said, “The large retail sector wants to collaborate with industry and agriculture to address the post-Covid challenges. For example, we are working together to eliminate unfair practices such as the gangmaster system in the fields and double Dutch auctions. Regarding the latter we supported the new law that has already passed in the House and is now being debated in the Senate. The discussion about the issues of prices and promotions is also ongoing.”
The Last Day of the Forum
The morning of the second and last day of the event was dedicated to the issues of agriculture and distribution. After the welcome speech by Teresa Bellanova, minister of agricultural policies, who pointed out, among other things, the commitment by the Italian government to fighting against traffic-light food labelling, “which leads to uninformed choices”, and unfair practices in agriculture.
Denis Pantini from Nomisma presented research on how Italian consumers’ behaviour is changing in the post-Covid era. Pantini also had the following warning for the Italian agri-food sector, “it’s necessary to address the Green Deal challenge rapidly, or we run the risk of other European countries boasting greater product sustainability, especially as traffic-light labelling could define Italian products as less competitive.”
Massimiliano Giansanti, president of Confagricoltura, said, “The central deciding issue of the future is the choice between agricultural and synthetic food. We believe that food must be linked with the land and we are opposed to lab-produced food. We are, of course, in favour of scientific and technological innovation and we follow with interest BioTech innovation, which represents the new frontier to stimulate production, without making genetic changes, such as GMOs. Agricultural Italy must produce more: today only 75 per cent of what ends up on Italian tables is produced by us.”
Ettore Prandini, president of Coldiretti, said, “In order to increase exports, the issue of infrastructure will also be important. Agricultural goods must travel less by road and more by train, plane and ship. We rank 7th in Europe for agricultural transportation by ship. The future will therefore be determined by logistics, infrastructure interconnections, and by renewable energies, with an increasing reliance on biomethane.”
Dino Scanavino, president of CIA Italian Farmers, said, “In order to make the agri-food system sustainable we will need to revisit the concept of supply chain: in addition to agriculture, food industry and large-scale retailing we must include transportation, the packaging industry, and manufacturers of both mechanical and robotic machines.” Scanavino also pointed out that almost 10 million Italians will have lower spending power, which means that prices of agri-food products will necessarily have to be kept low.
Paolo De Castro, S&D coordinator in the European Parliament Agricultural
Commission, called attention to the fact that “the financial resources of the CAP common agricultural policy account for almost 40 per cent of the European budget and the Recovery Fund amounts to an additional 7.5 billion euros.”
Antonio Cellie, CEO of Fiere di Parma, summarised the achievements of Cibus Forum: “For the first time after lockdown, we have gathered together the main players in the agrifood sector. We had an attendance of over 1,000 operators a day and about 3,000 streaming viewers, many of whom foreign buyers, not to mention the over 50 players in the agri-food sector who have spoken from the stage. Joint reflection has identified the following concepts: lockdown has led consumers to a better understanding of the value of food and the work behind it, therefore we need to insist on the promotion of Italian food; we urgently need support measures for the HoReCa sector and in particular for restaurateurs, who are the great teachers of quality food in Italy and in the world; innovation combines the history of local areas with new technologies, therefore ancient traditions, drones in agriculture and compostable packaging. It's a beautiful landscape of polycentric innovation, and therefore suited to the eclectic Italian talent. The next event is Cibus 2021, which will start on May 4 and will be the first major European food fair after lockdown.”
Roberto Luongo, general director of the ICE Agency, spoke about export issues, and pointed out the increased teamwork between institutions dealing with exports: “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the ICE Agency, and the Ministry of Economic Development. The ICE Agency has undertaken to guarantee the reimbursement of expenses incurred by companies that have suffered from the cancellation of trade fair events, and is finalising the organisation of Fiera Smart 365 for the digitisation of trade fairs and B2B meetings, promoting e-commerce for businesses and their presence in the large retail sector.”
Numerous representatives of the Large Retail sector spoke at Cibus Forum: Marco
Pedroni, president of Coop Italia and new president of ADM Associazione moderna; Giorgio Santambrogio, MD of the VèGè Group (who spoke yesterday); Alessandra Corsi from Conad, Eleonora Graffione from Coralis, Grazia De Gennaro from Despar, and Tanya Kopps, CEO of Metro Italia. Some of the latter participated in the round table discussion ‘Women wake up earlier' and agreed, among other things, about the need to identify new forms of communication to the consumer, going beyond the promotions system, which has often damaged the market.
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