Innovative products. But also new production processes. Naturalness and sustainability. Packaging that is not only compostable or recyclable, but also increasingly well designed. Innovation in the agri-food industry has many faces and TUTTOFOOD wants to explore them all. From this point of view, contributions of great interest will come from the partnership with Gdoweek, the historic distribution magazine, with which TUTTOFOOD is organising the new competition dedicated to the most innovative solutions in the sector. Solutions that, in the 2021 edition, will be the main focus of the dedicated Innovation Area.

But what does it mean today to talk about innovation in the Food & Beverage sector? For Cristina Lazzati, Editorial Director of Gdoweek,it is mainly to do with knowledge and the figures who interpret it: "Today the figure of the retail buyer is undergoing a major rethink. Increasingly, CEOs say they want buyers who know the product better, who know more, who know how to 'choose'. In this sense, I believe that for buyers and for their future in the company, it will be important to be at TUTTOFOOD 2021 because it is there that they will be able to take home that selection of innovative products that can differentiate them from their competitors, whereas today, buying only on the basis of price and negotiation, we too often find ourselves with assortments that are too similar to each other".

“The pandemic was a setback for innovation in the sector - Lazzati adds - and as a result there is now a great hunger among operators for innovative products. I think that a competition dedicated to innovation is a good way to highlight these products, also rewarding the efforts made by companies to continue innovating in a difficult period. What does it mean to innovate? For example, there is a great deal of tension towards packaging, there is much talk of sustainability and ethics, and there is great attention to controlled, guaranteed and transparent supply chains. While during lockdowns there was a certain 'patriotism' in purchasing, today not everything has to be 'Made in Italy'. But everything has to be described and explained in a transparent way. Especially among younger people, the choice of Made in Italy is not driven by territorial preferences, but by the awareness that food standards are stricter in our country. Traceability that guarantees the same security serves the same purpose, irrespective of the origin”.

In terms of innovation, therefore, it is increasingly confirmed that the horizon of Food & Beverage can and must be international, the same internationalisation that has always characterised TUTTOFOOD.