A leap in ice cream consumption with the arrival of the great heat in the first real early summer of 2022 despite a price increase of nearly 10% nationwide.
This is what Coldiretti affirms on the basis of the latest Istat data on one of the most loved products by Italians and foreigners which, however, suffers from the surge in costs for energy and raw materials used in the preparations, from sugar (+ 6%) to milk (+ 7%) up to eggs (+ 9%) also due to international tensions linked to the war in Ukraine.
The positive impulse to the sector comes after last year the Italian ice cream recorded a growth of 19.5% compared to the previous one for a value of 2.3 billion euros, explains Coldiretti on Sigep data.
A race that hopefully will continue with the return of tourists, including foreigners, in the summer of 2022 marked by the overcoming of the restrictions of the Covid pandemic.
However, production is affected by the jump in energy and raw material costs due to the conflict in Ukraine which - underlines Coldiretti - is heavily penalizing the 39,000 national ice cream parlors that employ 75,000 people.
In Italian ice cream parlors 220 million liters of milk, 64 million kilos of sugars, 21 million kilos of fresh fruit and 29 million kilos of other products are used during the year with an obvious impact.