Fish preserves

Canned tuna worth 1.6 billion: sales down 4%

Anchovies and sardines gain market share: growth in both volume and value in 2024

28 May 2025

Diminuiscono i consumi di tonno in scatola

3' min read

Where does the tuna in the classic can that we usually consume come from? From tropical seas, in particular Thailand, Indonesia, Seychelles and Papua New Guinea. This is the yellowfin tuna, while thebluefin tuna - now present in smaller quantities in our seas - is regulated by means of Icat quotas and a fishing ban and destined for the niche Japanese market.

There is someone who remembers that bluefin tuna, protagonist in spite of himself of the slaughter off the Trapani coast. He is Filippo Amodeo, vice-president of Ancit (the Association of fish canneries and tuna-fishing factories belonging to Confindustria) and director of the company Nino Castiglione (137 million turnover in 2024, 130 million cans produced annually). His grandfather - founder of the company - 'took over' the Favignana tuna fishery from 1985 to 1996, which had previously belonged to the Florios, a family of merchants, shipowners and patrons. With them, tuna processing underwent epochal transformations, going from being stored in salt in wooden barrels, to being preserved in oil, to being canned in tins.
The years under Castiglione's management are also punctuated by gripping tales, (such as the capture of a white shark in 1987); they taste of strong arms, dawns and fatigue, with the fishermen intent on conveying the tuna to the so-called 'death chamber', while the rais intoned the classic litany that accompanied the work. There was only fishing for 40 days a year between May and June: tuna are stateless and that was the period when they crossed the enchanting stretch of sea overlooked by the Trapani crescent. Then the flow ceased.

Today, the Nino Castiglione company - which over the years has necessarily had to reconvert to yellow fin to reach break even - is the leading Italian producer of private label canned tuna for some 30 large-scale distribution players, including Coop, Conad, Esselunga and Filippo Amodeo spends a good part of the year on the other side of the world verifying the reliability of super-certified suppliers and the quality of the raw material.

Canned tuna holds high the flag for canned fish, while pickles and sardines are nibbling new market shares: in 2024 they grew in both volume and value (+2.7% and +4% the former, 5.3% and 3.4% the latter). Produced and processed abroad (mainly Albania and Morocco) they are imported as finished products to Italy to be sold. Together with other canned fish (mackerel, canned salmon, seafood starters), they account for a quarter of the market, worth 400 million euro.

As far astuna is concerned, 110 thousand tonnes will be sold in the retail sector in 2024, worth EUR 1.6 billion (including catering).

In comparison to 2023, Circana figures show a decline of 4%, matched by a slight increase in turnover of 1.5%. Inflation effect, but not only. Ancit explains it well. "Given the increase in oil costs,the industry has proposed formats containing reduced quantities," comments president Giovanni Battista Valsecchi. Instead, the quantity of tuna remains unchanged, which cannot fall below the minimum required by law (65% of tuna in the case of tuna in oil, 70% in the case of natural tuna). "Nothing to do with the much contested shrinkflation, just "a commercial strategy to contain prices and to satisfy the anti-waste needs of consumers who, in most cases, throw away the oil used in cans to preserve the product," he concludes.

Export is growing, reaching 30,600 tonnes, gaining 9.5 percentage points compared to the previous year. Germany, Greece, Austria, Croatia and Slovenia are the main recipients of the flows, but new markets are also growing: Eastern Europe, the Arab Emirates and Canada, thanks to the Ceta agreement.

The sector is also looking at new markets, both offensively (Mercosur area) and defensively (Asean area). "In the first case, it is a question of evaluating the opportunity of starting new business in areas that are little covered, and in the second case, of overseeing the agreements under negotiation with competitor countries, with the aim of further simplifying trade relations, reducing customs barriers and promoting mutual economic development," explains Ancit director Giorgio Rimoldi.
Having concluded the agreement with Vietnam, attention is now focused on Thailand and Indonesia "on whose exports there are 24% duties, which should remain".