Credit: Marco Verch (flickr, https://www.flickr.com/)

Credit image: Marco Verch, Flickr

The VéGé Group is to open 63 hypermarkets in northern Italy next year, taking its market share to 7% and total number of outlets to 1,250, with 50 shopping centres. Sales in 2018 reached €1.6 billion, up 3% from 2017. 

Aldi Süd is to expand its Italian network with the addition of 80 new stores and a new distribution centre in Landriano, near Pavia, to better serve the north-west of the country. According to reports from Il Sole 24 Ore, the German discounter is mainly targeting metropolitan areas, particularly Milan and its environs. The new stores will open in 2020 and will consist of 600m2 and 800m2 structures. 

Italy’s grape sector is desperately trying to stop the alarming decline in production. Since 2008, the country’s production area has shrunk by 66%, from 70,870ha to 46,850ha. To reverse this trend, the sector is working to improve quality, innovation and promotion. Despite the decline, Italy is still Europe’s leading producer (over 1 million tons), with Puglia and Sicily leading the way. One area in which Italy needs to change is in its varieties, which for now are mainly with seeds, whereas the trend is now very much for seedless. 

Italy’s fruit sector has sounded the alarm: there is a shortage of workers, from the fields to the warehouse. The measures that the Italian government are taking to prevent migrants entering the country are hurting the agricultural sector which for so long has depended on the flexibility these workers provide. From the north to the south of the country, the situation is the same.

CSO Italy has announced a 34% drop in Italy’s 2019/20 pear crop. The total harvest is expect to reach 511,000 tons. The fall is spread across all of the main varieties, especially for Conference, Abate and Kaiser, less so for William B.C., Santa Maria and Max Red Bartlett.