«Yes to organic Italy and to the Messina bridge, no to bans and propaganda»- Corriere.it

Sitting in the cellar of the Sicilian producer Tornatore,
Oscar Farinetti
he launches the applause for Donna Nina, wife of Cavalier Francesco, and for her extraordinary caponata, dragging the table along with her enthusiasm and with her proverbial and programmatic good humour, seasoned with optimism. A moment later, he freezes a group of Messina, away in Castiglione: «What does Sicily need? But the bridge, of course: it will be your revolution”. The inhabitants of Messina point out that the Trapani-Ragusa railway line still needs 13 hours, 8 minutes and an incalculable number of curses, and they are ironic: if we really have to build the bridge, let’s make it in the shape of a cannoli.

Who knows, Farinetti, one of the few to decline a voracious commercial and entrepreneurial vocation with an idealistic and cosmopolitan vein, may not grasp the idea. Always poised between Silvio Berlusconi and Adriano Olivetti between Jeff Bezos and the Baffo of teleshopping , between partisan roots and casual modernity, this langhett from Alba (mother of Barolo and father of Barbaresco, not a bad pedigree) is our prophet of optimism. She has just written a book about it, «copied» he says, with the cheek and cheeky sympathy of someone who wants to amaze with something incredible (but true). He never stops launching into new adventurous enterprises, Farinetti, in spite of the Italians, who “are the saddest people in the world” and in the face of “neophobes”, those who are afraid of the new. In the country of «saints, poets and navigators», he is a poet (he published «Quasi», with «La Nave di Teseo»), navigator as well (he made an ocean crossing with Silvio Soldini, with the claim «I love Barolo and Grana Padano»)as far as holiness is concerned, he is equipping himselfbut do not despair.

In the near future, he swears, he just wants to read and study, but in the meantime he is very thirsty and already the eleventh wine cellar acquired. It is no coincidence that he has arrived in Sicily for a Garibaldian tour, which stops at “Contrade of Etna”an event that recounts the incredible rise of Carricante and Nerello Mascalese and of this volcanic wine which until a few years ago was the Cinderella of Sicily and now (thanks to the Andrea Franchetti) had an incredible boom and counting 209 producers and a turnover that attracts journalists from all over the world, from the British Decanter to the American Wine Spectator Bible.

The eleventh Farinetti winery is right on Etna — Carranco estatein partnership with Tornatore — and so the volcanic Farinetti seizes the opportunity to set foot on the new golden mountain (where he anticipated it the king of Barbaresco Angelo Gaja), glossing over the economic difficulties of his park «FIG» and on those of Eataly (which he sold to refinance it, leaving it in the hands of his son Andrea).

So, the bridge, we said. Wouldn’t it be better to build the other infrastructures, railways, airports, roads in Sicily first? “But this is benevolentism. The most touristic country in the world is Thailand, which is also the one with the least infrastructure in the world. The worst trains in the world are in the most advanced country, the United States. There is always something else to do first. Even when they built the Sistine Chapel and the Eiffel Tower, there was someone who said there was much more to build». OK, but the money? Matteo Salvini had introduced himself to Bruno Vespa to say that “only” 8 billion is needed, in the meantime we have already reached 14.6 and the Def has established that there are no hedges. «And in fact the bridge will never be built. But what’s the problem with money? Do you know how much excess global liquidity is? The bridge should be done by the mayors of Messina and Reggio Calabria. I take them to the president of Jp Morgan or Blackstone. If you have a brilliant and profitable idea, money is a breeze: 15 billion can be found tomorrow morning as well». If that’s not optimism.

As for agriculture, Farinetti manages to acrobatically keep together the traditional romanticism of Carlìn Petrini with the pragmatism of large-scale retail trade. «We are condemned to sell beauty», she repeats with a claim that could look good on an Eataly pallet (or on a Bacio Perugina). But then he launches a new utopia: «Think how nice it would be if the Minister of Agriculture convened a press conference tomorrow morning, broadcast live in Rome, New York and Sydney, to say: from today all of Italy must be organic. A government with the attributes should do this. Think what a shot. We started first, with organic farming, now France and Spain are beating us».

It could be argued that scientists like Elena Cattaneo argue that it is an illusion and a harm to convert everything to organic farming, because soil consumption would double. Farinetti protests: “But it’s not true, I have 700 hectares all organic for 14 years and we produce the same as before. We’re doing great and we’ve even increased our prices by 30 percent. Evidently this government has other things to think about. And yet, it is perhaps the government that in recent years seems to be giving more space to our agriculture and to Made in Italy, even if it then leans towards Anglicism. Almost all were present at Vinitaly. Isn’t that a sign of interest? “No, it’s just propaganda. Do you think Lollobrigida is an agricultural expert? Who rules in Italy is Coldiretti. The government limits itself to saying nonsense such as “we must only eat Italian”. Well, and then what do we say to the world? That we only eat Italian and they have to buy from us instead? What do we export?”.

Paradoxes of sovereignty, which the internationalist Farinetti (his father called UniEuro in 1967 in homage to Altiero Spinelli) really doesn’t like. In politics, he reiterates, he does not want to enter (“I’m not capable”), but then he does a lot of politics. He was Renziano convinced, now he doesn’t deny him even if the crush is over: “He was an excellent mayor,” he says, not without malice. Today he prefers to regret Draghi: «We had the coolest politician of all, the world envied him, and we threw him down. It’s incredible. Now we have a government that wants to ban everything. Cricket flour? But we have always eaten insects. Julius Caesar ate crocodile steaks with Cleopatra. Think, incredible: in Piedmont there is a strange race of humans who feed on raw meat. Raw!».

What about synthetic meat? «What do we care, it’s useless stuff. Instead of banning that, and stopping the research that is essential, we should take care of our animals. We have too many and treated badly. In Italy there are 6 million cattle, 13 million pigs and 500 million chickens raised as if they were in Guantanamo. Enough with intensive farms, which pollute and yes, they are full of feed with synthetic chemistry ». Farinetti is 68 years old and fresh and upright like an Etna Bianco. In his latest book “The hen was born first … maybe” he unleashes a vein as a narrator-communicator halfway between Luciano De Crescenzo and Alessandro Baricco. He sticks Grillo and praises the sardines (“but they must have been called anchovies, they smile more”), he quotes Churchill (“Never give up”, later adopted by Bossi with “never mula'”) and praises Leonardo da Vinci, who opened the restaurant « The Three Frogs» and closed it in six months, but who cares. Farinetti is one and two: he is the son of an entrepreneur, but also of a partisan, deputy mayor of Alba, and he doesn’t forget it: «The most beautiful day of the year? April 25th.”