With the war in Ukraine, the risk for the Cuneo economy is to lose an interchange worth 170 million euros. As well, net of the import-export match, the commercial value that the Cuneo area had in the first nine months of 2021 with Russia and Ukraine. The import itself is worth little: 12.6 million euros from the two countries is nothing when compared to the billions that imports in this province every year. And of this figure, only 3.2 million are goods arriving from Ukraine. Moreover, with the plus sign: + 27% of imported product compared to pre-Covid. These are mainly wood (79.6% of the total), food products (13.4%) and metal (4.1%). From Russia, on the other hand, the Cuneo area brings in wood and paper (40.3%), rubber-plastic (38.3%) and means of transport (13.8%). These are the cross-referenced data of Confindustria and the Chamber of Commerce.
So Russia and Ukraine supply us largely with timber: “forests” for almost six and a half million euros. And then what comes under the “food” item, that is, products already partially transformed, derived from wheat, and destined for the rich agri-food district that exists here. But contrary to popular belief, it’s not a big deal. And this is explained by the world of agriculture in this province. The data show that, in the third quarter of 2021, the Cuneo area imported wheat and cereals from Ukraine for just 63 thousand euros. Which is practically nothing if you think of the market turnover that this moves on the real locomotive of the territory: the agri-food district.
This is to say that the countries of the East are no longer the granaries of Europe. The grain of our food industry now comes from Canada and France. Yet why is the Ukrainian crisis so frightening that Coldiretti talks about a 10% increase in prices? «Because it is happening that whoever has wheat keeps it. This will cause prices to go up a lot – explains the director of Coldiretti Piemonte Bruno Rivarossa -. We are no longer used to thinking in terms of wars. But when they do, the markets react in one way: protectionism. And cereals, since the world began, are one of the thermometers of what is happening globally. Prices have already skyrocketed due to the lack of ethical sense of the multinationals: we expect other, unsustainable increases ». This is why we are trying, right in the Cuneo area, to create new cereal crops. But it is a speech that still has a lot to say. And it remains unto itself.
In the meantime, even if not closely linked to the crisis in Ukraine, here are the increases that are coming precisely on the food industry linked to flour. An example? The Maina doves at Easter will cost 15-20% more. Not to mention, if it continues like this, next Christmas: it will be a disaster. «We had to adjust the price lists because there is no raw material that hasn’t doubled. And the situation of uncertainty linked to the war and the new flare-up of gas and energy that awaits us worries us immensely, “says Maina’s CEO, Marco Brandani.
And looking ahead, even the paper industries, but above all wood, fear the instability of markets shaken by the war. Not just for what is in the spotlight. But also for all those states, from Estonia to Latvia to Poland, which are the great green lungs of wood in Europe. From windows to roofers, dependence on foreign countries in this sector is a consolidated reality. “And now our raw materials are starting to run out” confirms Lorenzo Elia, head of the Confindustria Cuneo section: fifty companies, a thousand employees. «In this province there is very little timber from Ukraine. But the forests of the North and East are vital for us. We would not want them to become too short a blanket for our companies already suffering ». That’s the way it goes for paper too. It is missing everywhere and now there may not be enough as well for the students to study. “We have reached the point where we need to print textbooks” explains Marco Martini, president of the paper section of industrialists.