Food-Wine

(ANSA) - Modena, November 4 - Police in Modena on Wednesday seized over one million euros of balsamic vinegar produced in violation of the traditional recipe.

According to police, the batch of 161,000 litres was bottled without first being aged in wooden casks for two months, a fundamental requirement for the internationally protected label.

Police said the 323,000 confiscated bottles would be relabled and distributed as simple salad dressing.

(ANSA) - Verona, November 3 - Everything is ready for the premiere of this year's Vino Novello, the Italian cousin of the better known French Beaujolais Nouveau, which takes place Thursday and Friday at the Verona trade fair grounds.

While the novelty of Novello has worn off in recent years and production continues to decline, the wine maintains a strong following and has carved out its own market niche.

(ANSA) - New York, November 2 - Exports of sparkling Italian spumante and prosecco wines have overtaken those of French champagne by as much as 30%, according to the Italian Wine & food Institute (IWFI).

Italian bubbly exports surpassed those of champagne, IWFI explained, ''due to an increase in the volume of the Italian wine exported to the USA, up 9%, while those of French champagne fell sharply, -27% in the first eight months of 2009.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 30 - Pumpkin sales this year are holding up in Italy, farmers union Coldiretti announced Friday ahead of Halloween weekend.

Higher yields and lower prices have helped keep demand high, said the organization, noting that consumers appeared to be buying pumpkins more for traditional autumn recipes than for Halloween.

Grown throughout the country, pumpkin makes a popular pasta filling during the fall months and the main ingredient of a vegetable stew typical of the northern region of Lombardy.

(ANSA) - Brussels, October 29 - A traditional sour cherry jam produced near Modena has become the latest Italian food speciality to obtain a European Union protected label for its unique quality.

The Amarene Brusche di Modena jam was awarded a PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) seal by the European Commission on Thursday along with 'grelos' turnips from northern Spain and meat-and-vegetable-filled dumplings from Germany, 'Schwabische Maultaschen'.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 29 - The Lazio regional administrative court (TAR) on Thursday upheld fines totalling 12.5 million euros slapped on 26 pasta producers and the national producers' union Unipi for creating a cartel with the aim of stifling competition and driving up prices.

The fines were imposed last February by Italy's anti-trust authority which examined price trends from October 2006 through March 2008.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 29 - Italian women lead one out of three agricultural firms in the country, a study by farmers' union Coldiretti revealed Thursday.

According to the report, women run nearly 260,000 agricultural business in Italy, the second leading sector for female business owners behind commercial services.

Over one in five women entrepreneurs work in the agriculture sector, added the organization whICH said the number is bound to increase.

(ANSA) - Florence, October 27 - This year should be a good vintage for Chianti Classico wine, according to the consortium of producers who make the famed Italian red wine.

''We were already very optimistic before and during harvest but now we are sure 2009 will be a good year, having been able to touch the fruit which was produced with such care over the past months,'' Chianti Classico consortium chairman Marco Pallanti said on Tuesday.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 26 - A restaurant tucked away in the hills of central Italy was declared the nation's best by the 2010 Restaurants of Italy guide released Monday.

Published by the leading food and wine magazine, Gambero Rosso, the guide again put the Ristorante Vissani, named after its chef and founder, Gianfranco, in first place with 95 points out of 100.

(ANSA) - Washington, October 21 - American authorities no longer have any cause to block the imports of the prized Italian wine Brunello di Montalcino, Italian Agriculture Minister Luca Zaia said here.

The green light came from the head of the United States Treasury's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB), John Manfreda, who met with Zaia on Tuesday.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 20 - The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) announced major reforms to its international roundtable on food security on Tuesday.

The organization said member states agreed to make the Committee of World Food Security (CFS) ''the foremost international platform dealing with food security and nutrition'' as a central component in the global strategy for stamping out hunger.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 14 - The global recession has pushed the number of hungry people in the world to over one billion, according to a report released Wednesday by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization and the World Food Programme.

Falling exports and diminishing foreign aid have hit developing countries hardest, according to the report, plunging 100 million people into the ranks of the world's hungry, an increase of over 9%, over the past year to the highest levels since 1970.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 12 - Agriculture must become more productive if the world is to avoid widespread famine in the next 40 years, United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization Director General Jacques Diouf said Monday.

Opening a high-level expert forum in Rome on how to feed the world in 2050, Diouf said ''the combined effect of population growth, strong income growth and urbanization will almost double the demand for food, feed and fibre''.

As a result, ''agriculture will have no choice but to be more productive,'' Diouf said.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 12 - The man who made decaffeinated coffee acceptable Italy and pioneered the marketing of bottled mineral water has died at the age of 80.

Austrian-born Tommaso Berger built a food empire after the war and made the Hag decaffeinated coffee brand, which he acquired from a German merchant in 1950, a household name by marketing it as the closest to the real thing with all the aroma and taste of coffee but without the caffein.

He also promoted drinking bottled mineral water and at one time owned the Fiuggi, Sangemini and Levissima brands.

(ANSA) - Rome, October 12 - Global food stores will be running dangerously low in 40 years unless the world starts spending more on agriculture, United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization Director General Jacques Diouf said Monday.

Opening a high-level expert forum in Rome on how to feed the world in 2050, Diouf said food production would have to increase by 70% in order to feed the estimated 9.1 billion people who will inhabit the earth by mid-century, around 2.3 billion more than today.