Italians told don’t spend a penne on pasta in protest
The price of basic commodities are being driven up by middlemen, while farmers and producers’ earnings remain flat, activists said at protests in Rome, Milan and Palermo.
In the case of pasta, Italians will soon be paying up to 20% more for their daily serving of fettuccine, linguine or spaghetti. Picking on Italians’ staple to draw attention to their cause, consumer groups called the one-day pasta strike yesterday, not against eating it, but against buying it.
In the capital, a few dozen people protested in front of parliament, handing out free pasta, bread and milk to passers-by. Pasta was also handed out in front of the Trade and Competition Antitrust Authority to help out those Italians who decided to support the strike.
“Prices increase by five times between production and consumption,” Toni De Amicis a leader of Italian farm lobby Coldiretti said during the protest in Rome. “The right recipe is to reduce the gap between production and consumption.”
Consumer groups as well as Italy’s farmers association met with the president of the authority to push for an investigation into the pasta industry.
Since shoppers typically stock up on their pasta, buying multiple packages at a time to always have it on hand, the impact of the strike was mostly symbolic. Few shoppers seemed to give it much notice at all.
“I wasn’t aware of the strike, but I do know about the expensive prices,” said Emanuela Mafrolla, 34, a consultant and mother, shopping in central Rome. “Pasta is a basic dish. How could I possibly give it up?”
At a Roman trattoria, a diner who only identified himself as Giovanni echoed a similar sentiment as he tucked into a plate of fettuccine for lunch. “Today is pasta strike and we eat it anyway!”
At Rome’s Rebibbia prison, however, inmates were taking part, refraining from buying grain products at the prison shop, ANSA news agency reported. But they were eating pasta and other products provided in the prison cafeteria.
