Italy: surge in canned food sales

Always a valuable resource in times of emergency, epidemics and wars, canned food is experiencing a surge in supermarket sales.

Surveys conducted by Anfima, the Italian National Association of Manufacturers of Metal Packaging and Similar Goods, have revealed a sharp rise in sales of products packed in metal packaging, a solution that ensures a long shelf-life while maintaining the product’s nutritional qualities.

The figures are confirmed by Nielsen: in the retail sector, sales of canned tomatoes grew by 82.2%, canned meat by 56% and tuna preserved in oil by 33.6%. The research department of Confagricoltura (Italian Agricultural Confederation) has reported a 29% overall increase in sales of canned food.

“Purchasing canned food is not a necessity but a decision to choose a form of packaging with more than two hundred years of history that still today offers unique characteristics for protecting and preserving food,” explains Giovanni Cappelli, General Manager of Anfima. “Choosing canned packaging is also an act of environmental responsibility given that metal packaging can be recycled indefinitely.”

After use, steel and aluminium containers are easy to separate and can be recycled an unlimited number of times while maintaining their original qualities, allowing new products to be created without generating waste.