The Agrifood System in Italy

In this article the authors describe the most important changes of the Agrifood system in Italy during the last twenty years. The paper describes the structural transformation of Agriculture and the effort of food industry to adapt to the internationalization of food markets. Agriculture and food industry are conceived of as two components linked by functional relations of the Agrifood system. The structural changes of Agriculture are expressed by a consistent decrease in occupation and contribution to the GNP. However, structural changes vary greatly between regions and can be explained by a different deaee of specialization, concentration of resources, technologies and rural development. Because of structural inefficiencies (small scale, low concentration and integration) and poor commercial strategies, food industry has encountered some difficulties. However, progress has been made during the eighties to cope with these changes.