Coldiretti has chosen Tuttofood, the World Food Exhibition in Milan, to launch a weighty indictment against the American actor Leonardo di Caprio in reference to the allocation of 2 million euros granted to two Dutch companies engaged in the production of "meat" in the laboratory from cells in vitro. The loan was granted to Nutreco and Mosa Meat where the famous American actor Leonardo di Caprio has also invested
It is unacceptable - Coldiretti accuses - that the European Union finances the private business of test-tube "meat" with public resources, behind which significant economic interests and international speculation are hidden, aimed at upsetting the world agri-food system. All the more, -adds the organization that DiCaprio who certainly doesn't need the money of European citizens.
Among other things, this is not the only episode of a public figure who aims to do business with food, even Bill Gates has thrown himself – it is appropriate to say – on the bone. The financial support was also granted as part of the React Eu program that the Commission had launched to respond to the crisis generated by the Covid emergency which brought the livestock system to its knees in Italy and in Europe.
There is a risk of supporting a skilful marketing operation which - underlines Coldiretti - aims to modify natural food styles based on quality and tradition without having carried out a real independent verification on the ethical and environmental impact of these products on which a growing number of multinationals to do business.
For the Italian organization, the decision to support companies that aim to compete unfairly on the market by passing off products obtained from cell multiplication in the laboratory combined with growth factors and substances compatible with biological tissues as meat, adds to the ongoing demonization campaign for real meat.
A double pincer that threatens to close the stables with losses of jobs and traditional productions whose distinctiveness is a strategic component of Made in Italy in the world.
"The demand for quality and guarantee of origin has led to a real boom in the breeding of historic Italian meat breeds which, after having risked extinction, have returned to repopulate the countryside from the Apennines to the Alps" says the president of the Coldiretti Ettore Prandini who underlines "the breeding activity has a fundamental role in preserving landscapes, territories, traditions and culture because when a stable closes an entire system is lost made up of animals, meadows for forage, typical cheeses and above all people committed to fighting depopulation and degradation often for entire generations".
