There is no doubt that in Food & Beverage two of the main drivers of growth are exports on one hand and access to organized distribution on the other. Factors that often overlap: i.e., it becomes easier to develop business in markets with a large increase in large-scale retail. A criterion that becomes even more important for producers positioned especially in mature markets, such as Europe.

So what is the state of the art of organized distribution, and which markets are worth targeting? Recent research by Deloitte, which looked at the top 250 groups globally, confirms that the world's large-scale retail sector is enjoying good health, with sales in 2021 up 5.2% from the previous year, compared with a 4.4% increase in 2020. Sustainability is confirmed as one of the main purchasing motivations: and Food & Beverage is the segment where consumers chose sustainable products the most (42%), followed by household products (25%).

What to aim for: up and coming in the world, niches in Italy

On the merits of individual countries, another survey, this time by Kearney, identified the most attractive by combining several factors, including the pool of potential consumers and the market saturation index. On the top step is China, with 1,402 million people and a saturation of only 13.1%. Completing the podium are India, with 1.4 billion people but a higher saturation index (63.7%), and Malaysia, with a low index (27.2%) but a much smaller population (33 million). For Kearney, however, the region to watch in the near future is undoubtedly Africa, characterized by a young population with disposable income growth of 9% a year, the highest in the world. Of particular interest are Egypt, Morocco and Nigeria.

As for Italy, data compiled for TUTTOFOOD by IRI suggest a pause in packaged food sales in organized distribution, with value sales of 21,273 million euro from January to May 2022 (+0.6 percent over the same period in 2021). However, the exploits of some product categories such as Fresh Desserts (+18.2% to 155 million), Pasta (+15.2%; 522 million) and Recurrences (+15% 598 million) stand out. On the other hand, Beverage continues its run, which in April surpassed the a billion euro mark since the beginning of the year (1,020 million) thanks to value sales that more than doubled (+150%) compared to the same period in 2021.