Drought, climate change, and alien insects are hitting fruit and vegetable production, and the damage bill has reached over 3 billion euros, including damages and extra costs for monitoring and defending the fields. This is the alarm raised by Coldiretti, which points out, among the new invaders, the red spider mite and Popillia japonica, the Japanese beetle. The latter can affect over 300 plant species and represents a real disaster because it has settled mainly in Northern Italy, with growing concern for vineyards and fruit trees. “New harmful organisms are added to those already present, causing production declines and increased costs,” Coldiretti reports. “There is also the now constant presence throughout the national territory of the Asian stink bug, which attacks orchards, hazelnut groves, and vegetables, directly damaging fruits and seeds and compromising their commercial quality. In Piedmont, biological control continues in 2026 with the use of antagonistic insects.”
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Other alien species include Drosophila suzukii, the spotted wing drosophila native to Asia, which mainly attacks cherries, blueberries, raspberries, and other soft-fleshed fruits. Monitoring confirms the presence of the insect and makes it necessary to maintain high protection of crops close to harvest. In Veneto, there is an alarm for the red spider mite, a mite that has been commonly present in the area for years, which mainly affects soy and corn, crops already struggling due to drought. The intense heat and lack of humidity favor – Coldiretti continues – the proliferation of this mite that attacks leaves, first causing yellowing and then drying, with negative effects on plant growth and productivity. Concern remains high for the chestnut gall wasp, which has already caused heavy losses to chestnut cultivation and continues to require biological control interventions through Torymus sinensis, its natural antagonist. There is also concern for the Asian hornet, Vespa velutina, which threatens bees and thus the entire pollination system. In 2026, monitoring and containment interventions have been strengthened in several regions. The risk concerns not only honey but also the role of bees for orchards, vegetables, and other crops. Then there is Aethina tumida, the small hive beetle that can compromise honey stocks and weaken colonies, the bark beetle, responsible for the death of Norway spruces and causing heavy damage to forest heritage, and the red palm weevil, which continues to attack palms especially in Mediterranean areas such as Liguria. On the olive-growing front, the most serious threat remains Xylella fastidiosa, the bacterium that has devastated millions of olive trees in Puglia and continues to register new outbreaks, putting production, landscape, and the economy of affected rural areas at risk. Not to be forgotten is the emergency caused by the blue crab, which continues to pressure Italian mollusk farming, especially in the Adriatic. It is hoped that the octopus is the natural antagonist of the blue crab. The die-off of clams and other mollusks was compounded this summer by the effects of exceptionally high water temperatures, with heavy die-offs in farms.
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“It therefore becomes increasingly urgent,” emphasizes Coldiretti, “to strengthen prevention and monitoring, accelerate research into biological and sustainable defense systems, and provide companies with adequate tools to face the arrival and spread of new harmful organisms, but also of old pathogens that become dangerous again with climate change, such as brown spot or eriophyid mites, avoiding that phytosanitary emergencies turn into structural crises for entire supply chains.”
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