Introduction to Rapporto sulla Federconsorzi by Manlio Rossi-Doria

The Rapporto sulla Federconsorzi (Report on the Italian Confederation of Agricultural Unions), published in 1963, is one of Manlio Rossi-Doria’s better known works. The book prompted widespread debate, not only among agricultural economists but, even more, in the national political arena. The reprint of the Report is therefore relevant for an understanding not only of how the huge economic and political patrimony built during the fifties an sixties was dissipated with the bankruptcy of the Federconsorzi in 1993, but also of the changes in Italian agriculture over the last few decades. The introduction to the reprint of the Report underlines the particular contribution offered by Rossi-Doria for a better understanding of the recent structural changes in the Italian agriculture and the agri-food system.