“Innovation is going to be one of the most important themes in the agricultural sector over the next decade and often sustainability and innovation are seen as conflicting: it is thought that sustainability in agriculture is only possible taking a step back, but I strongly believe it is not true: a sustainable agriculture has to be an innovative agriculture”. This is how MEP Herbert Dorfmann, President of the European Parliament Intergroup “Wine, alcoholic beverages and quality food products”, has opened the March 6 2018 workshop “New standards in wine sustainability and transparency to consumers” held at the European Parliament in Bruxelles. In the course of the workshop Nicoletta Fascetti Leon (Italian Ministry for the Environment, Land and Sea- AT Sogesid) presented VIVA project after the speech of Giuseppe Blasi (Responsible for the Directorate General of Agrarian Development – Italian Ministry for Agricultural Food and Forestry Policies) which reported the importance of the work done in order to harmonize the National Quality System of Integrated Production and VIVA, aiming at the creation of a single sustainability public standard in the Italian vinicultural sector. These elements of innovation integrate good practices in field and winery with sustainability performance measurement systems and sustainability performances monitoring aiming at continuous improvement. It has been discussed how to increase the culture of sustainability among producers and the drivers for farmers in order to promote the employment of sustainable practices keeping up with innovation and maintaining control over production stages at the same time. This change can only happen if sustainability is seen as an ally to the production of typical and quality food. This workshop in Bruxelles has consolidated the national path toward a single sustainability standard in the vinicultural sector and it includes issues specifically related to the communication between producers and consumers which should be aware of producers’ commitment to sustainable practices.

dott.ssa Gloria Luzzani
gloria.luzzani@unicatt.it
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore