Food made in Italy first manufacturing sector

Italian food exports are sailing towards the 57 billion euro record. The forecasts come from the Federalimentare Study Centre, which has just processed data on Italian exports for the first seven months of 2024.

Between January and July this year, national food & wine posted a sustained growth of 9.3%. The success of Made in Italy food therefore does not stop, after a 2023 in which it had already reached 52.2 billion, effectively doubling its value in ten years. Among the most sought-after products abroad in these first seven months of 2024 is wine, which has collected 5 billion euros in exports; followed by confectionery with 4.3 billion, dairy with 3.4 billion, oil with 2.6 billion, pasta with 2.5 billion and processed vegetables with 2.5 billion. Among the key markets for the Italian food industry is the United States, with an export value of over 4.4 billion euros and +19.7% compared to the first seven months of 2023. In first place among our destinations, however, is still Germany, with 4.6 billion in food exports (+5.3% over the first seven months of 2023).

It is therefore also thanks to exports that the agro-food industry today - according to the latest report of the Rome Business school - is Italy's leading production chain in terms of contribution to GDP, with a performance that is worth 4.5 times that of the automotive industry, 4.4 times that of furniture and 2.3 times that of fashion. Federalimentare's figures confirm this: with a 2023 turnover of 193 billion euros, the food industry now ranks first among Italian manufacturing sectors in terms of value and second in terms of both the number of companies (over 60 thousand) and employees (464 thousand). This is also confirmed by the presence of numerous companies in this sector in the Sole 24 Ore-Statista Leader Growth 2025 ranking.

However, if we look at the productivity of the sector, according to the Rome Business school, Italian food industry in Europe ranks only 15th, with an average of 45 thousand euros per employee, lower than the EU average of 52 thousand. Again according to the study, to reach the average productivity of the European top-10 it would be necessary to more than triple the average size of companies in the sector.

Even the Food Industry Monitor 2024 of the University of Pollenzo, in the face of the undoubted successes of the 'Made in Italy' food industry, recalls how much this excellence is still in the hands of relatively small and often family-controlled companies, with an average turnover of around 97 million euro and 178 employees. And this size can be a competitive limitation when operating in international markets.