First European producer, Italy will export its rice to China

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In Italy, there is a strange consequence of the coronavirus pandemic: since the start of the confinement period, rice consumption has exploded in the country. Italy is the leading European producer of rice, and the boot has not only boosted its national rice consumption but will even start to export… to China!

Publicity

“  It's a bit like selling ice cream to the Eskimos.  This headline from the Italian daily Corriere della Sera laughs at the success of the national rice, whose producers signed an export agreement with China at the end of April. The middle empire will in fact import specific Italian varieties, for the manufacture of the famous risotto, such as Carnaroli, Arborio or Roma. But it is especially in the Italian peninsula that demand has exploded.

According to Coldiretti, the first Italian agricultural union, its consumption jumped 47% during the first six weeks of the pandemic, to the point of dethroning, for a short period, that of "pasta", pasta.

Half of European rice production

If Italy remains a grain of rice on the scale of world production, the country is by far the leading European rice producer: with 1.5 million tonnes per year, Italy alone accounts for almost half of Union production. The sector employs more than 4,000 producers, mainly in the north of the country, in Lombardy and in Piedmont.

Historical detail and little known: it was Leonardo da Vinci in person who designed, at the end of the 15th century, the arrangement of the irrigation canals which enabled the development of this culture in the country.

► Read also : Rice will be less nutritious due to climate change

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• Italy
• China
• Agriculture and Fisheries

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