The Italian Trade Agency (ITA) in Toronto and Canada’s largest food supermarket chain, Loblaw, have joined forces to promote genuine food and beverages imported from Italy across 100 stores in the North American country as they expect sales of Italian products to receive a boost from strong consumer demand for authenticity amid implementation of the CETA free-trade deal with the European Union. The promotion ‘From Italy with Amore’, which runs from October 12 until November 1, confirms the increasing popularity of the Italian cuisine in Canada.
A series of events
ItalianFood.net was at the launch of the promotion in Toronto. We toured the Loblaws Maple Leaf Gardens store in downtown Toronto, and the flagship store of Loblaw-owned Fortinos in Woodbridge, Ontario, which is home to a large Italian Canadian community. This is an important first step which will bring important results, said Matteo Picariello, the Canada director of ITA, the government-backed agency which promotes Made in Italy products around the world. A series of events from in-store demo to cooking classes, cheese cracking and tasting events are taking place in 100 stores across the country to promote authentic Italian passion for food. The spirit of this initiative, which is part of a series of events taking place in the United States and other countries, is to bring authentic Italian food from niche stores to large supermarkets and closer to the consumers, said Mr. Picariello. Vince Scornaienchi, Vice President at Fortinos, said serving Italian food has been the mission of the Canadian supermarket group since its foundation in 1961. But demand for authentic food has grown. The profile of food that we have now available is incredibly higher than what it used to be. There’s grand demand from both the Italian and non-Italian community, Scornaienchi told ItalianFood.net.
Watch the video from the opening day: