China is served: how Chinese fruits and vegetables are knocking out our products.

INCREASE IN FRUIT AND VEGETABLE IMPORTS –

Have you ever eaten a Chinese mushroom? And the peeled or the mozzarella cheese Made in China? If the answer is no, consider yourself lucky: Imports of agri-food products from China, whether illegal or regular, are constantly growing and are outside the controls provided for by the usual Babel of laws that are almost never effective. When there are too many, and sometimes contradictory. If the answer is yes, then prepare for the final bang: an invasion of Chinese products in Italy, and this time not from Asia, but from Africa. And therefore not of terrible quality either.

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IMPORTATION OF CHINESE FRUIT AND VEGETABLES –

Over the past ten years, China's agricultural imperialist strategy, hungry for land and the labor to cultivate it, has known no limits. The Beijing government, directly or indirectly through state-owned companies or fake private entrepreneurs, has acquired approximately 100 million acres of agricultural land in Africa.That is, in countries like Senegal, Togo, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Tanzania, and so on: a veritable colonization that, in addition to marking China's strategic advance in Africa (while we are either cynically indifferent to Africa's problems or become a melting pot for illegal immigrants), is dealing a serious blow to Italian agriculture and the entire fruit and vegetable supply chain. Where, I repeat ad nauseam, we have great opportunities that must not be squandered, to create jobs, economic growth, well-being, and new and healthy economic development.

In fact, in the very fertile African lands, The Chinese produce vegetables and fruit (from melon to pomegranate, to talk only about our products too), vegetable and even aromatic herbsFrom lentils to tomatoes, we enter direct competition with the heart of Italian fruit and vegetables.

Thus Chinese products, but this time not counterfeit but original, and grown in the wonderful African land, they are invading the European markets, the Middle Eastern countries and a good part of the world. And who is losing market share in these rich and promising markets? Italian fruit and vegetables.Despite the immense value of our goldmine of fruit and vegetable exports (€4,76 billion per year), despite the generosity and sometimes even the innovative capacity of thousands upon thousands of skilled farmers, despite the many repeated appeals, often in vain, and despite the goodwill of Minister Maurizio Martina, to support Italian agriculture.

EXPORT OF ITALIAN FOOD PRODUCTS ABROAD –

In terms of fruit and vegetable exports, our country is only fifth in the European Union's intra-EU trade rankings. And in first place are the usual, now successful, Spanish competitors, while is it even possible that the Netherlands can export twice as much Italian fruit and vegetables to Europe, despite having only a tenth of our cultivated area? This is a pure waste, not only for Italy, but also for agricultural companies in the sector.

We are losing the game against Polish apples and against Dutch and German salad (which you can regularly find on sale in Sicily!), while our exports have collapsed even in the North African market. And without exports to the global world, in agriculture as in all economic sectors, there is no way out of the Great Crisis., a new development model is not created, one that is healthier, more solid, and less exposed to the risk of relapses. Instead, we simply raise our hands in the face of Chinese and non-Chinese competitors, and even their rubbish, or former rubbish, which then ends up on our tables.

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