White paper on creativity - ebla center

Chapter 6need for guidelines to be shared atnational level in order to produce auniform classification.A similar problem arises concerningthe communication of the quality offood and services in the restaurantsector. Restaurants are anindispensable driver for the diffusionof excellent products as theingredients in recipes and specialdishes. We would stress that in therestaurant sector interestingmechanisms of cascade diffusion havemeant that typical products fromluxury restaurants are being adopted inmore popular economical restaurants,thus bringing widespread success forproducts, such as farro (emmer andspelt), the pomodoro di Pachino (thePachino tomato) and lardo di Colonnata(Colonnata lard), to cite three of thebest-known examples.The Pachino tomato and farro: twosuccess storiesIn the 1970s some vegetabledistributors in the Pachino area ofSicily came up with the idea ofhighlighting the name Pachino onboxes containing local cherrytomatoes. Consumers thus began toassociate the characteristics of thatparticular tomato with the name. Theconsortium protecting the Pachinotomato, now made up of 500businesses, have identified some ofthe features which have made thisproduct successful:• taste• consistency of the pulp• shiny skin• long shelf-life• high content of vitamins (Vit. C)and antioxidants (lycopene).Long shelf-life is one of the strengthsof the tomato which is sold in sealedpackages, in line with the productrules and regulations. This is obviouslya great advantage when exporting theproduct.The rise to international fame led toan inevitable proliferation of similarproducts, making it necessary toprotect the Pachino tomato, initiallythrough IGP certification. Today 500tonnes of IGP cherry tomatoes areproduced, while a further 700 tonneshave no certification. Considerablecompetition comes from Hollandwhere protected crops yield 5000 g/hacompared to the 1000 g/ha in theoriginal Pachino zone. The responseto these “attacks” has been to raise thequality standards certified by the EUand to elaborate strategies aimed atpromoting the product with the endcustomer. One company has evencreated a tracking system withinformation sent to mobile phones.To reassure customers who wantinformation about the provenance oftheir purchases, the company siteenables them to follow the variousstages in the production chain bysimply keying in a lot number.Pachino tomatoes are used in a vastarray of recipes: over 19,000 can beconsulted online in Italian andEnglish.The second example of a successfulIGP food is the hulled wheat speciescollectively called farro in Italy(Einkorn –Triticum monococcum;Emmer– T. dicoccum; and Spelt – T.WHITE PAPER ON CREATIVITY 142