CEDR (Comité européen de droit rural) - Commission III - National Report Italy - Significant current developments in rural law.

This report is the result of an arduous selection of the signs of significant current development in Italian agricultural law and is, therefore, necessarily succinct and non-exhaustive. Starting from the premise that Italian agricultural law is inevitably influenced by the evolution of EU policies and strategies, which in turn are sometimes conditioned by decisions, recommendations or suggestions adopted at international level, this report only marginally takes into consideration the main news related to the two pillars of CAP 2014-2020, that are examined in the national reports of Commissions I and II, but instead takes into account the 2013 National Report. The main significant developments in Italian agricultural law since the last Congress are related to: A.The application of Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 on the provision of food information to consumers. In particular, the focus is on the debate on the absence of "the site of production or packaging" information among mandatory indications for pre-packed food, and on additional mandatory information about the place of provenance of food. B.The protection of quality products and the fight against counterfeiting that the Italian government is currently carrying on especially in the PDO and the PGI sectors, thanks to the ex officio protection provided for in regulation (EU) No 1151/2012, and in the extra virgin olive oil sector, through the introduction of the mandatory use of non-refillable bottle caps. C.The issue of land use, with special reference to agricultural land consumption and abandonment, e.g. through the creation, at Regional level, of "Land Banks" which manage and repurpose an inventory of underused and abandoned rural lands in order to promote productive and sustainable use of uncultivated arable lands especially by young farmers. Sustainable Food Security has been chosen as the specific theme addressed in this report. As it is the overarching theme of Expo 2015, it has been attracting the attention of the Italian Government, Regions, Universities and Research Institutes during the last year. The various legal issues related to this topic include, for example: compatibility of 2014-2020 CAP with article 39 TFEU; competing interests of energy production and food production in situations of arable land use scarcity; promotion of the so-called "short supply chain" as an instrument of food waste prevention, and the promotion of local agriculture and food chains as instruments to support local rural economies reducing land abandonment; explicit mention of "food security" as exclusively national State legislation in the constitutional reform draft currently before the Italian Parliament and debate concerning the introduction into the Italian Constitution of explicit recognition of the fundamental right to food.