I normally focus on issues that deal with digital and online marketing, however while reading the news today I came across an article that in my opinion shows the world as we know it is falling apart. Let me caveat this with the fact that I personally do not eat cheese. I do not like the smell, the taste, the texture, I just avoid it as much as possible. With that knowledge I bring you news that with data showing growing food lines now in most major cities in Europe, the Italian government has come up with a way to help the needy while propping up one of its iconic industries.
The Italian Agriculture Minister, Luca Zaia, has committed to buying 100,000 30-kilogram wheels each of Parmigiano Reggiano and the very similar Grana Padano cheese to donate to the needy. The dairy farmers representative in Italy said that ‘this is a crisis of pricing, not of consumption.” Italian cheese producers you see, sought government help in the face of prices that have fallen some 25 per cent over the past five years. The producers faced pressure from distributors who offer sharp discounts on the cheeses to lure shoppers into supermarkets.
The government said it will buy three per cent of the annual production at market prices. The Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano consortia put the value at 50 million euros ($83 million).
Apostoli said the measure doubles the usual government acquisition of Parmigiano and Gran Padano under an EU program to provide food for the poor. Italy was allocated 66.4 million euros ($110 million) in 2008, which will nearly double to 129 million euros ($214 million) next year, according to the Agriculture Ministry.
The government also plans to convene a round table with distributors to negotiate sales promotions that will be fairer to producers, as well as launch campaigns to promote Italian Parmesan abroad, where it can command higher prices.
An overwhelming 85 per cent of the Parmigiano Reggiano and Grana Padano produced is consumed in Italy; Coldiretti estimates that some 60 per cent of that is sold at discounted prices.
Who knew that Cheese would become a focal point of the global economic downturn?
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