**2.2 Tasting of typical products: the food trail**

Other than for art, Italy is worldwide identified as the country where you eat and drink well. Words as "pizza," "pasta," "espresso," and "cappuccino" have conferred to food a universal dimension, thus becoming brands of a gastronomic globalization. Italy is actually one among the countries where the food and wine offer is wider and more diversified. With its 863 appellations (**Figure 2**)—299 IG food (35%), 526 IG wine geographical indications (61%), and 38 IG spirits (4%)— Italy comes before France (764) and Spain (358). The most important years in the creation of geographical indications of origin go from 1996 to 2012. Distributed by regions, agri-food IGs predominate in Emilia Romagna (45), Veneto (38), and Lombardy (36), while wine appellations prevail in Piedmont (59) and Tuscany (58). Furthermore, in Italy, there are 172,688 restaurants of which are 586 of excellence, 11,632 farms with restaurants, 18,632 farms with accommodation, 170 wine routes

#### **Figure 2.**

*Geographical indications of Italy's food (2019). Source: our elaboration from www.qualigeo.eu/ statistiche-eu-dop-igp-stg/.*

#### **Figure 3.**

*Trend geographical indications of Italy's wine and food (1974-2017). Source: our elaboration from www.qualigeo.eu/statistiche-eu-dop-igp-stg/.*

and flavors, and 99 museums of taste (reports on gastronomic tourism, data from 2016 to 2017) (**Figure 3**).

These few numbers help to understand the articulation of the gastronomic tourism economic background, which merges together countryside and city, family kitchen and starred cuisine, large markets and small shops, private companies, and public policies. In the first year of life, the *Fabbrica Italiana Contadina* (FICO), the large thematic area inaugurated in Bologna, had 1 million visitors, and the turnover was 50 million euros. Another Italian event related to food and that attracts hundreds of people is the Vinitaly organized every year in Verona. In the last editions dedicated to showcase Italian and world wine, there were more than 200,000 visitors, demonstrating the economic and media force of great food-related events in contemporary society [40].

Special attention deserves the routes of wine, oil, pasta and flavors because they are networks spread all over the Italian peninsula by involving a large number of small municipalities. The routes of flavors are a tool, which offers to a vast part of the Italian peninsula the opportunity of an evolution oriented toward both the upgrading and the development of the territory. This process is important to promote the development of less economically advanced areas, such as mountain areas currently experiencing a loss of population as well as of economic activities. In these areas, in fact, most of the typical products are produced (3200 local productions come from the Italian mountain areas), they in these territories, less favored and tendentially excluded from modernization processes, become a resource capable of giving value to their development by integrating and enhancing the different territorial resources. Moreover, it is unanimously recognized that typical products, as a form of expression of the culture of a territory, greatly influence the social and economic development of local rural territories, in particular through the achievement of the following socioeconomic benefits: the increase in income from agricultural enterprises, greater social vivacity, a territorial regeneration, through the valorization and conservation of traditional activities, and finally also the development of a food and wine tourism that can contribute to improving the economic sustainability of these territories.

On the backdrop of a global redefinition of economic balances, the routes of typical products—much of them located also in marginal territories and mountains areas—operate at different levels, including the promotion of tourist systems and thematic routes that are able to bring back vitality to marginalized areas faraway from major routes and rail links. Geographical marginality can, therefore, become a useful resource, and the routes represent an efficient tool of its promotion and image communication. They include a very articulate set of initiatives, which involves a wide number of public and private actors variously participating a network, which is going to become, thought in a way not always systematically integrated, the engine of new forms of local development among shapes, structures, and geographies of a constantly changing territory.

The innovative dimension of the roads' governance is based upon the necessity of building strategic alliances, which demand territories to establish new relations reshaped according to common interests and objectives, and it can now operate through a multitude of instruments of various kinds, such as strategic plans and programs, projects of territorial, urban, environmental and tourism marketing, integrated projects, etc. These tools represent an innovative approach for the governance of territorial development and transformation processes in terms of environmental and socioeconomic sustainability, not last thanks to the use of adequate information systems, the formation of consent, and the participatory construction of decision-making processes.

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*Rural Tourism and Territorial Development in Italy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85774*

quality development models.

A route of typical products originates from the will and the union of the strengths of numerous subjects, linked together by an effort of engagement and networking led within the frame of a territory. It is possible to identify its main components by analyzing the product (wine, oil, pasta, cheese, rice, etc.), the territory (countryside, burgs), the ecosystem (landscape and environment quality enhancement), and the

The routes, therefore, represent an example of public-private collaboration that aims at channeling, through thematic routes, various subjects of a specific territory, which compose a supply chain around a typical product, thus integrating the product knowledge and tasting as well as the tourist use of territory in a coherent meta-market. In fact, the establishment of the routes determines the implementation of a tourism development strategy especially addressed to more fragile territories, such as the rural areas, where the main tourist attraction is the presence of an intangible heritage that must be enhanced through experiential, sustainable, and

More specifically, the Italian legislator has enacted a specific national law for the wine routes whose aims, however, can be extended to other typical products such as oil, cheese, etc. The roads of wine are indeed governed by the law of the 27th July 1999, n. 268, where, in Article 1, they are defined: "(…) paths marked and advertised with appropriate signs, along which gather natural, cultural and environmental values, vineyards and cellars of single or associated farms open to the public; they represent an instrument through which the territories and the relative productions can be disseminated, commercialized, and enjoyed in form of tourist offer." Main goal of the law is to promote territories with a wine vocation, with particular reference to places with high-quality productions. National legislation highlights how a route can be considered as an integrated system of both territorial and tourism offers organized along a route characterized by places of historical, artistic and environmental interest, flanked at the same time by a series of structures of reception, promotion and marketing of local products. Definition in art.1 of the 1999 national law reflects an approach consistent with the new multifunctionality of the rural world. This regulatory intervention provides the necessary prerequisites in order to increase the competitiveness of the territorial systems and to contribute to the formation of the roads themselves, by aiming at creating effective networks characterized by a bottom-up approach, which require active partnership as well as planning skills on the part of the public and private operators belonging to both the

key players: producers, tour operators, associations, and institutions.

chain of typical products and the tourism sector (**Figure 4**).

Wine tourism turnover in Italy ranges between 2.5 and 3.5 billion euros as a result of a tourist movement involving about 4 million people. A prime example of transformations connected to the gastronomic development is the small Tuscan town of Montalcino where, between 2011 and 2016, tourist arrivals related to wine increased by 125% (from 5000 to 24,000), thus favoring a multiplication of hotel facilities (from 14 to 50) and beds (from 78 to 620). Montalcino, which takes advantage of the excellent international image enjoyed by Tuscany, is not a lonely example of growth. Among other areas in Italy that in recent years have experienced a radical change in their image are Conegliano (Veneto), Oltrepò Pavese (Piedmont), the Langhe (Piedmont), and Montefalco (Umbria). These places are a clear demonstration of changes that have taken place in Italian tourism over the last decades when, under the effects of the industrialization crisis and of the growing criticism about the massive construction of the coasts, the tourism model moved from a mass "sun and beach" tourist offer toward a more diversified idea of how to enjoy a free time. In the light of this new tourist demand, related to the attractiveness of the campaign and of the consumption of typical products, producers also were induced to adapt

*Rural Tourism and Territorial Development in Italy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85774*

*Sustainability Assessment at the 21st Century*

2016 to 2017) (**Figure 3**).

in contemporary society [40].

sustainability of these territories.

of decision-making processes.

and geographies of a constantly changing territory.

and flavors, and 99 museums of taste (reports on gastronomic tourism, data from

These few numbers help to understand the articulation of the gastronomic tourism economic background, which merges together countryside and city, family kitchen and starred cuisine, large markets and small shops, private companies, and public policies. In the first year of life, the *Fabbrica Italiana Contadina* (FICO), the large thematic area inaugurated in Bologna, had 1 million visitors, and the turnover was 50 million euros. Another Italian event related to food and that attracts hundreds of people is the Vinitaly organized every year in Verona. In the last editions dedicated to showcase Italian and world wine, there were more than 200,000 visitors, demonstrating the economic and media force of great food-related events

Special attention deserves the routes of wine, oil, pasta and flavors because they are networks spread all over the Italian peninsula by involving a large number of small municipalities. The routes of flavors are a tool, which offers to a vast part of the Italian peninsula the opportunity of an evolution oriented toward both the upgrading and the development of the territory. This process is important to promote the development of less economically advanced areas, such as mountain areas currently experiencing a loss of population as well as of economic activities. In these areas, in fact, most of the typical products are produced (3200 local productions come from the Italian mountain areas), they in these territories, less favored and tendentially excluded from modernization processes, become a resource capable of giving value to their development by integrating and enhancing the different territorial resources. Moreover, it is unanimously recognized that typical products, as a form of expression of the culture of a territory, greatly influence the social and economic development of local rural territories, in particular through the achievement of the following socioeconomic benefits: the increase in income from agricultural enterprises, greater social vivacity, a territorial regeneration, through the valorization and conservation of traditional activities, and finally also the development of a food and wine tourism that can contribute to improving the economic

On the backdrop of a global redefinition of economic balances, the routes of typical products—much of them located also in marginal territories and mountains areas—operate at different levels, including the promotion of tourist systems and thematic routes that are able to bring back vitality to marginalized areas faraway from major routes and rail links. Geographical marginality can, therefore, become a useful resource, and the routes represent an efficient tool of its promotion and image communication. They include a very articulate set of initiatives, which involves a wide number of public and private actors variously participating a network, which is going to become, thought in a way not always systematically integrated, the engine of new forms of local development among shapes, structures,

The innovative dimension of the roads' governance is based upon the necessity of building strategic alliances, which demand territories to establish new relations reshaped according to common interests and objectives, and it can now operate through a multitude of instruments of various kinds, such as strategic plans and programs, projects of territorial, urban, environmental and tourism marketing, integrated projects, etc. These tools represent an innovative approach for the governance of territorial development and transformation processes in terms of environmental and socioeconomic sustainability, not last thanks to the use of adequate information systems, the formation of consent, and the participatory construction

**152**

A route of typical products originates from the will and the union of the strengths of numerous subjects, linked together by an effort of engagement and networking led within the frame of a territory. It is possible to identify its main components by analyzing the product (wine, oil, pasta, cheese, rice, etc.), the territory (countryside, burgs), the ecosystem (landscape and environment quality enhancement), and the key players: producers, tour operators, associations, and institutions.

The routes, therefore, represent an example of public-private collaboration that aims at channeling, through thematic routes, various subjects of a specific territory, which compose a supply chain around a typical product, thus integrating the product knowledge and tasting as well as the tourist use of territory in a coherent meta-market. In fact, the establishment of the routes determines the implementation of a tourism development strategy especially addressed to more fragile territories, such as the rural areas, where the main tourist attraction is the presence of an intangible heritage that must be enhanced through experiential, sustainable, and quality development models.

More specifically, the Italian legislator has enacted a specific national law for the wine routes whose aims, however, can be extended to other typical products such as oil, cheese, etc. The roads of wine are indeed governed by the law of the 27th July 1999, n. 268, where, in Article 1, they are defined: "(…) paths marked and advertised with appropriate signs, along which gather natural, cultural and environmental values, vineyards and cellars of single or associated farms open to the public; they represent an instrument through which the territories and the relative productions can be disseminated, commercialized, and enjoyed in form of tourist offer." Main goal of the law is to promote territories with a wine vocation, with particular reference to places with high-quality productions. National legislation highlights how a route can be considered as an integrated system of both territorial and tourism offers organized along a route characterized by places of historical, artistic and environmental interest, flanked at the same time by a series of structures of reception, promotion and marketing of local products. Definition in art.1 of the 1999 national law reflects an approach consistent with the new multifunctionality of the rural world. This regulatory intervention provides the necessary prerequisites in order to increase the competitiveness of the territorial systems and to contribute to the formation of the roads themselves, by aiming at creating effective networks characterized by a bottom-up approach, which require active partnership as well as planning skills on the part of the public and private operators belonging to both the chain of typical products and the tourism sector (**Figure 4**).

Wine tourism turnover in Italy ranges between 2.5 and 3.5 billion euros as a result of a tourist movement involving about 4 million people. A prime example of transformations connected to the gastronomic development is the small Tuscan town of Montalcino where, between 2011 and 2016, tourist arrivals related to wine increased by 125% (from 5000 to 24,000), thus favoring a multiplication of hotel facilities (from 14 to 50) and beds (from 78 to 620). Montalcino, which takes advantage of the excellent international image enjoyed by Tuscany, is not a lonely example of growth. Among other areas in Italy that in recent years have experienced a radical change in their image are Conegliano (Veneto), Oltrepò Pavese (Piedmont), the Langhe (Piedmont), and Montefalco (Umbria). These places are a clear demonstration of changes that have taken place in Italian tourism over the last decades when, under the effects of the industrialization crisis and of the growing criticism about the massive construction of the coasts, the tourism model moved from a mass "sun and beach" tourist offer toward a more diversified idea of how to enjoy a free time. In the light of this new tourist demand, related to the attractiveness of the campaign and of the consumption of typical products, producers also were induced to adapt

#### **Figure 4.** *Wine routes in Italy (2019). Source: our elaboration.*

their structures from simple places of production into suitable structures for tourist accommodation.

Some figures can help to clarify. In Italy, there are today more than 1200 cellars equipped to receive tourists and the cellars that can be visited are over 12,000. During individual visits and wine tours, they offer tastings, visits to the vineyards, and other recreational and educational activities. Estimating the economic impact of food and beverage tourism is, at best, very difficult. In an approximate way, knowing that this industry is characterized by a particular type of tourists the food travelers—which escapes easy definitions and estimates suggest that the wine tourists who visit the cellars bring about a 31.35% increase in turnover, an increase that should be distributed through the entire tourist supply chain (hotels, restaurants). These percentages recall those of the WFTA, according to which approximately 25% of visitor spending can be attributed to food and drink while traveling. This change took place almost naturally in extra-European countries such as Australia or New Zealand, where the wine tourism sector grew together with viniculture, while in Italy and in the European countries in general, the transformation of wineries in tourist destinations has induced a business change in order to adapt buildings and rural settings to visiting activities. A change was also required in terms of offering the visitor the image of a sustainable production, attentive to the preservation of nature and to the application of the most modern technologies for recycling and saving energy. In this sense, wine tourism at the beginning of the twenty-first century is a perfect example of contemporary society trends.

**155**

*Rural Tourism and Territorial Development in Italy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85774*

**tourism in Italy**

**3. Landscapes and cultural heritage, a case study: the olive oil** 

the territory and the history of the Mediterranean countries.

new resource for tourism development linked to the world of olive oil.

and activities to an economic and social enrichment.

The implants for the production of oil, as well as being the places that are characterized by the proposal of emotional content and *sense making*, constitute a concrete case to be placed in the broader concept of heritage cultural [50]. In fact, oil mills are to be considered a testimony to the time of the oil production processes. As a result of the standardization imposed by industrialization, oil mills handed down the specificity of the individual territories, for example, thinking to the high historical value of the mills in the grottoes existing in the Italian region of Puglia. The historical oil mills can thus constitute fundamental architectures for the enhancement of the territory, because they allow the visitor to get closer to realities that bear witness to the knowledge and the productive know-how of a community, the relations with the territory where they insist, contributing with their presence

With this in mind, buildings that still retain particular architectural values must be protected and enhanced through initiatives that support the agricultural production of services (tourism, recreational, educational, and social). New forms of use of the mills are established in which tourism activity is taking a leading role, as demonstrated by the results of the research that will be presented in the following paragraphs. Olive oil tourism is certainly a recent phenomenon of tourism; it is a matter of following in the footsteps of wine tourism that has managed to place the

Olive tree is the most typical Mediterranean plant and olive oil, other than the symbol of a millenary culture, and is considered since the twentieth century as a fundamental food for the health of people (Mediterranean diet). Moreover, olive tree and oil are two clear examples of environmental and social sustainability. Given this cultural value, in recent years, following the wine model, tourism too has begun to look with interest at the attractiveness of the olive-covered landscapes as well as to the possibility to be acquainted with the olive oil production techniques. A specific tourist offer has, therefore, been created, which is strongly linked to both

There are numerous studies that highlight a relationship between tourism and olive oil; initially the international literature, in particular in Australia, has highlighted how oil tourism is essentially an expression of the wider phenomenon of rural tourism [40, 41]. Furthermore, the study of tourism related to olive oil has been investigated in Europe, especially in Italy and Spain [42–45] where the researches have not only enhanced the rural aspect but also highlighted how the interest in olive oil can give value to the tourist image of a destination becoming a new narrative of the territory that underlines the link between landscapes, culture, typical products, and tourism [46]. Oil tourism does not just become a further expression of the activities linked to rural tourism and to the agri-tourism, but also to cultural tourism and for its organoleptic qualities, that of health [47]. The results of the first studies on oil tourism conducted by Ruiz Guerra [47] show how initially, the interest of tourists in the olive oil industry was linked above all to the sale of products connected to it, which then activated new forms of economy for the territory, as had already happened for wine tourism [48, 49]. However, the researches that highlight the interest of tourists increase not only for oil production, but also for production sites and landscapes [40]. Furthermore, oil tourism refers not only to representational images and to visual perceptions of places, but also to a perception relative to the other senses. In fact, the results of a recent research [39] highlight how tourists show a particular interest in visiting the mills that become a

*Sustainability Assessment at the 21st Century*

their structures from simple places of production into suitable structures for tourist

Some figures can help to clarify. In Italy, there are today more than 1200 cellars equipped to receive tourists and the cellars that can be visited are over 12,000. During individual visits and wine tours, they offer tastings, visits to the vineyards, and other recreational and educational activities. Estimating the economic impact of food and beverage tourism is, at best, very difficult. In an approximate way, knowing that this industry is characterized by a particular type of tourists the food travelers—which escapes easy definitions and estimates suggest that the wine tourists who visit the cellars bring about a 31.35% increase in turnover, an increase that should be distributed through the entire tourist supply chain (hotels, restaurants). These percentages recall those of the WFTA, according to which approximately 25% of visitor spending can be attributed to food and drink while traveling. This change took place almost naturally in extra-European countries such as Australia or New Zealand, where the wine tourism sector grew together with viniculture, while in Italy and in the European countries in general, the transformation of wineries in tourist destinations has induced a business change in order to adapt buildings and rural settings to visiting activities. A change was also required in terms of offering the visitor the image of a sustainable production, attentive to the preservation of nature and to the application of the most modern technologies for recycling and saving energy. In this sense, wine tourism at the beginning of the twenty-first century is a perfect example of contemporary

**154**

society trends.

accommodation.

*Wine routes in Italy (2019). Source: our elaboration.*

**Figure 4.**
