The commodity explained with wheat, but also with Halal Food
"Twelve nations in the world guarantee the 80% of the supply of food commodities". It opened like this Amedeo Reyneri, lecturer at the University of Turin in the Department of Agricultural Sciences, the debate on the wheat system, "the most important and most cultivated cereal in the world".
The theme of wheat commodity it has been addressed not only from an economic point of view. This is because "it is an enormous system, one of the most complex that we have." The suggestions that the professor feels he is giving are two: "To regain competitiveness it is necessary to orient commodities towards specialties, ie to respond to the most advanced demands of the agri-food networks. "Italy, for example, is trying to produce a particular grain. Secondly, to journalists I suggest, as this is a complex system, to pay attention to simplifications, easy slogans, stereotypes. By simplifying a lot, you risk a lot".
His colleague Paolo Biancone, Professor of Management, has instead addressed the issue of ethics through an example: that ofHalal Food, the Arab feeding system that concerns one and a half billion Muslims. "In the Arab world, ethics is the will of God: halal is all that is permitted. Haram is the opposite and from the food point of view it is pork or alcohol. It is very important for our companies. The knowledge of what is lawful and what is illegal can be an opportunity for companies that operate in the food business and to discover new markets. The concept in Italy is quite developed, even if there is not yet a restaurant that is certified as entirely halal food ".
“Today the international scenario indicates that the watchword of the markets is the volatility and this creates uncertainty ": to say it is Roberto Iotti of the Sun 24 Hours, which explains that "the meeting between supply and demand has changed considerably. The lack of wheat in North Africa led to the Arab spring of the 2010. But first it was called bread uprising: this is how the lack or the fact of being able to manage supplies turns into a factor of geopolitics ”.
Francesco Mele of Slow Food concluded the debate: “An industrial model cannot be used in which the only thing that continues to be central is profit in its cynicism. This is not the winning model for feeding the planet. One cannot be against enrichment, certainly, but if profit is at the center and not social interests, this system is no longer sustainable ”.
di Sara Iacomussi e Monica Merola (Futura)
