At Milan Food Week: talks on the link between food and wellbeing, and tastings
The event is back after a seven-year hiatus: as well as food and wine experiences, there will be events focusing on wellbeing, biodiversity, research and new eating habits
Key points
How are our eating habits changing? How important are wellbeing and value for money in our daily shopping? And how are research, businesses and the catering sector responding? These questions form the starting point for Milan Food Week, taking place from Thursday 15 to Sunday 18 October, which returns after seven years with a new project exploring the relationship between food and societal change.
Organised by Sg Company Società Benefit and GoodGuys, under the patronage of the City of Milan, the event brings together universities, researchers, businesses, catering professionals and members of the public. The Food Hub Identità Golose at 3 Via Romagnosi is hosting talks, round-table discussions and in-depth sessions, alongside a city-wide programme of tastings, family workshops, sporting activities and initiatives to combat food waste.
Besserere takes centre stage, but with smaller trolleys
The context in which the event takes place is illustrated by the analyses YouGov, compiled for the session ‘Purchasing behaviour: wellbeing, generations and experience’, scheduled for 17 October. 51 per cent of Italians often or always consider their long-term health when making everyday purchasing decisions. The way people shop is also changing. In the twelve months ending in August 2026, Italian households made an average of 215.4 purchases of fast-moving consumer goods, including fresh produce sold by weight, compared with 206.7 in the previous twelve months: an increase of 4.2 per cent, accompanied by a 2.2 per cent reduction in the average spend per purchase. Shopping trolleys are getting smaller: the average number of items fell from 12.8 in 2023 to 11.7 in 2026.
This means that people are making smaller but more frequent purchases. Food choices also reflect an increasingly diverse range of needs and preferences. Among the information on packaging considered in the YouGov survey, 20 per cent of respondents would rely on high fibre content when choosing a product, compared with 13 per cent who cited high protein content. In 48.8% of households, there is at least one person who consciously reduces their meat consumption.
Research and nutrition
These are some of the phenomena that Milan Food Week aims to explore in depth, linking everyday behaviour with developments in the food sector and scientific knowledge. At Via Romagnosi 3, the programme will unfold over three days of in-depth sessions. On 15 October from 4.00 pm to 6.00 pm, ‘Food, Culture and Innovation’ will focus on biodiversity, research and applications in the food sector, with a contribution from the University of Milan-Bicocca and a dialogue between the scientific community and the business world. This will be followed, until 8.00 pm, by a cooking show with a free tasting of Felicia pasta.
