“Rice is much more than a product: it is the absolute excellence of our agri-food sector and an iconic ingredient of our cuisine” that drives “an export worth over 800 million euros a year, and the heart of this production is in this extraordinary land between Lombardy and Piedmont.” This was said by Giorgia Meloni, speaking at the second edition of Risò, the International Rice Festival inaugurated today in Vercelli. The event opened with a minute of silence for the passing of Emma Bonino and Raffaele Costa, requested from the stage by the Minister of Agriculture Francesco Lollobrigida.
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Meloni, welcomed on arrival with prolonged applause, greeted among those present the FAO Deputy Director Maurizio Martina, “Italy’s candidate to succeed as director, because we believe that Italy, like few others, can claim to have something to say about how to ensure good food for all the peoples of the world.” A direct jab primarily at Spain’s Pedro Sanchez, whose candidate is in the running.
Canale Cavour, “an example of the speed needed for infrastructure”
The Prime Minister, welcomed on arrival with prolonged applause, recalled from the stage the Canale Cavour, “the most far-sighted fruit of the far-sighted water revolution” and one of the “lessons for today’s politics: the speed with which extraordinary infrastructure was once built, the attention to water. We try to learn from what our grandparents knew how to do better than us.”
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Tribute to the mondine and the fight for the eight-hour workday
Meloni recalled how the Festival is linked to another anniversary: “It has been 120 years since the conquest of the eight-hour workday. Today we consider it an acquired right but at the beginning of the twentieth century it was a true revolution fought for and won by women.” We owe the mondine “a huge debt of gratitude.” On this “even Emma Bonino might agree with me.”
The “no” to low-standard free trade agreements
Meloni’s presence is not only a declared tribute to rice producers but also a promise to work together to not lose the excellence of rice growing, severely tested by drought and climate change and by duty-favored imports (under EBA regime) from Southeast Asia, particularly Cambodia and Myanmar (see Il Sole 24 Ore today at newsstands). “The rice supply chain is a cutting-edge sector, a flagship of Made in Italy and we are aware that this heritage must be protected and defended from unfair competition from countries that do not respect our social and labor standards.” The reference is to discussions around agreements with Southeast Asia. “You cannot make free trade agreements with countries that do not respect your standards. We compete not on quantity but on quality, and we have the duty to defend it.” The Prime Minister cites the example of pesticide regulations imposed by the EU, but not elsewhere.
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