The new trend of the restaurant sector is sustainability: it starts in the kitchens and develops a new awareness to minimize waste and encourage the reuse of goods, reducing the impact on habits leading to climate-change.

A process that finally seems not susceptible to setbacks, a culture of resource optimization that involves the entire extended “Farm to Fork” supply chain with a total value of over 538 billion and more than 3.6 million employees with Italy.

This new approach is part of the new healthy habits that affect the food choices of Italians. Purchases at the farm increase. The tendency to reduce waste, in fact, is harmoniously combined with the search for healthy and safe food. Safety is strongly linked to the origin, traceability and the complex world of certifications, which represents one of the most effective strategies to promote the enhancement and dissemination of the healthy Italian food and wine and agri-food product, and with it all the values ​​of sustainability of which Italian productions are carriers.

Fabrizio Capaccioli
Managing Director ASACERT

“Also due to the events of recent months there has been a profound change in purchasing habits” says Fabrizio Capaccioli, CEO ASACERT. “The unhealthy habits that we have had until today have opened the way to new priorities. We need to learn from Nature, which builds resilience through biodiversity. On the other hand, the law of conservation of mass is a physical law of mechanics, whose fundamental postulate by Lavoisier states that nothing is created, nothing is destroyed, everything is transformed. In the same way, to build an effective circular economy, even in the restaurant sector, it is necessary to develop new habits or, better, to go back to enhancing the ancient habits of the rural world, so that even the produces are really used in their entirety, albeit in different forms.”

Sustainability is increasingly present on food shelves: in 2018, there were over 13,000 products positioned for this purpose, an increase of + 14.3% compared to the previous year.

There is a growing awareness about the fact that cultivating the land also means protecting it and preserving it at the same time, focusing vigorously on innovation in integrated agriculture and on organic farming, which today in Italy has considerable numbers: 2 million cultivated hectares, 15% of the total farming surface, 72,000 operators involved for a turnover of 3 billion euros per year.

A large part of the Italian agricultural business is already proving to be very sensitive both to the needs of consumers and to the need for an epochal turning point to reduce environmental pollution processes. The novelty of these days involves restaurateurs, who decide to do their part through the conscious choice to reduce waste even in the kitchen, as well as when purchasing raw produces.

The contribution of ASACERT, as a specialized certification body, is realized in the field, through inspections aimed at verifying the compliance with the eco-sustainability criteria of Italian restaurants abroad. The green wave is investing the entire agri-food chain, from the producer to the final consumer. We cannot ignore tools that guarantee, through serious certification, the reliability of production processes, but also of packaging and distribution, in line with the growing demand for compliance with the criteria of the eco-philosophy. The value of a company, small, medium or large, today is measured not only on the basis of economic and financial results, but also on intangible elements that contribute to nourishing the relationship of trust with consumers, as well as having an influence on the image of the producer, its reputation and the final product.

A new model of agriculture and catering is making its way, a model fully embracing sustainability, in line with ecological and social criteria, an approach that, in all likelihood, will be part of the dossier that Minister Bellanova is preparing for the relaunch plan that Italy will present in the autumn in order to take advantage of the Recovery Fund, which provides an important boost to the development of agroecology in our country, through the use of good agronomic practices and a concrete commitment to a Green new deal also in this sector.

A new path that begins in the fields, passing through the kitchens and reaching restaurants, in a balance made up of interdependence in which the entire extended supply chain is inclusive and connected, and from which everyone benefits, first of all consumers.