Ismea has published a new report on organic food purchases by families  analyzing the post covid year 2021. In 2020, according to ISMEA, the expenditure of organic food and beverages had recorded an increase of 9.5%, exceeding by two percentage points the agri-food industry as a whole (+7.4%), thanks to a greater awareness of consumers about the quality of food.

In 2021, organic “shopping” has somehow "normalized", reaching a value of 3.38 billion euros, with a growth of 4.5% compared to 2019 - the last pre-crisis year, marking a physiological but unavoidable fallback compared to the record values of 2020 (-4.6%).

The detail of the categories shows a decline in purchases in value especially for fruit (-8.7%), vegetables (-7%), milk and derivatives (-2.2%), cereal derivatives (-0.4%) and fresh eggs (-8%). Meat (+13%), fish products (+17%) and wines and sparkling wines (+5.7%), on the other hand, are in clear countertendency, products that together are however worth less than 11.5%, confirming the growth of organic products especially in those sectors where the offer is less represented.

Organic products continue to be sold mainly in supermarkets and hypermarkets (65.3%). Despite a partial return of the consumer to normality, the incidence of sales in modern distribution grows compared to 2020 (+1%), while the contribution of e-commerce is reduced (-9.6%). In 2021, as in the previous year, 62.7% of sales of organic products are concentrated in Northern Italy, compared to a share of 25.6% in the Centre and Sardinia and 11.7% in the South.

The report, in Italian,  can be downloaded at this LINK

Source: ISMEA