A project on processing tomatoes delivers its first results after two years of field trials: agroecology improves quality and production efficiency. A project on processing tomatoes delivers its first results after two years of field trials: regenerative agriculture improves quality and production efficiency.
The tomato is a central ingredient of Italian cuisine and the Mediterranean diet, as well as a strategic economic asset for many regions. As with many other crops, its cultivation must contend with a now structural problem: the progressive loss of agricultural soil productivity.
This phenomenon is driven by multiple causes — from crop intensification to the prolonged use of chemical inputs, to the increasingly marked effects of climate change — and today it has a tangible impact on the economic sustainability of farming businesses and on the overall balance of the tomato supply chain.
That is why in 2024 the research project POMO.DO.RI. (the tomato of tomorrow, towards regenerative agriculture) was launched, led by the Consorzio interregionale ortofrutticoli (Cio) and applied to the processing tomato supply chain (i.e. tomatoes destined for transformation into passata, peeled tomatoes, concentrates and pulp, rather than for fresh consumption) across a production area stretching from the province of Cuneo to that of Ferrara, among the most important in the country.
The project stems from a shared need to systematically combine scientific research, field trials and supply-chain expertise in order to address increasingly evident issues related to agricultural land productivity and the sustainability of production models. The aim is to identify integrated solutions capable of improving and stabilising agricultural yields, reducing production costs, cutting reliance on synthetic chemical inputs, and increasing crop resilience to climate stress. It is an approach that places soil regeneration and production process efficiency as necessary conditions for tackling the transformations currently under way.
The total investment is approximately one million euros, funded 50 per cent by European funds and the remaining 50 per cent directly by the supply chain. The commitment has involved some of the sector's leading players: the producer organisations Ainpo, Casalasco and Poa, and the Department of Sustainable Crop Production Sciences at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Piacenza.
The project, spanning four years, includes several lines of experimentation developed directly in the field under real production conditions. Activities range from the adoption of low-impact soil tillage techniques and the use of precision irrigation systems, to the application of organic soil amendments and digestates, through to the evaluation of innovative varietal solutions — which will be the focus of the second two-year phase of research.
After the first two years of trials, preliminary analyses reveal the first positive signs:
"The ultimate goal of our experimental project is not to find the best single solution — said Marco Dreni of Cio — but to create a pool of good practices that can restore vitality to our soils and which, if correctly applied, can increase the sustainability of processing tomato cultivation."
"Regenerating Italian tomato growing means tackling the complexities of production challenges by considering soil, climate, cultivation technique and the agri-food industry together, according to an agroecological approach," said Professor Vincenzo Tabaglio of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. "A goal that can only be pursued through broad, shared and long-term experimental research, capable of generating concrete solutions along the supply chain."
The early results confirm the direction taken and provide the impetus to continue research over the next two years, with the aim of consolidating data and scalable solutions that can be replicated on a wider scale.