Del Bravo (Ismea): “The climate of confidence in agricultural businesses and the food industry improves”

“Ismea also noted an improvement in the confidence climate of agricultural businesses and the food industry, after the inevitable deterioration that accompanied the entire course of 2020”. Fabio Del Bravo, head of Ismea market services, says this in an interview with Adnkronos / Labitalia. “According to the Ismea index – he explains – which summarizes the opinions of operators on the current and future situation, there would be greater optimism on the trend of orders, especially in relation to prospects in the near future”. “The food consumption of Italian families – he continues – within the home, which was fundamental to support the sector during the hardest months of the pandemic, continues to maintain a growth trend even in the first part of 2021. We are obviously far from levels in 2020, when, as a result of the food service closures, there was a surge in food spending with peaks of up to 20% in the initial stages of the emergency compared to the pre-pandemic era “. “In the first quarter of this year – he remembers – we found a value of domestic food spending 3% higher than in the same period of 2020, and as much as 12% over 2019. Clearly, this increase is still affected by the persistence of restrictions to sociability, and we expect a progressive weakening of the growth trend in the wake of reopening and the return to normality. However, we expect that the thrust will not be completely exhausted, thanks to the widespread use of home-working, which from an emergency measure is increasingly becoming a structural phenomenon for many Italian workers, stably moving some meals within the walls of the house ” .