Campo Società Cooperativa Agricola

The award received is an important acknowledgement of our commitment towards a more sustainable world: CAMPO cooperative has been dealing with organic food such as pasta, tomatoes, and pulses for over 45 years, but in the last few years, we have felt the need to offer a further contribution to the protection of our planet through the development of innovative products that can provide concrete answers to today’s environmental emergencies.

We have always been aware of the quality of the Canù project, but collecting a few compliments from the world every now and then is good for the spirit and pushes us forward in search of new products to safeguard the Earth.

Can you share a bit of your company’s background?

CAMPO was founded in 1978—just when organic agriculture was beginning to take root in Italy—at Isola del Piano, a small village deep in the countryside of the Le Marche region, in answer to a specific demand for healthy food grown without poisoning the land.

In the 1970s, it was only too clear that ploughing chemicals into the earth was damaging people’s health and well-being and destroying our very future. Obviously, organic agriculture was the only way forward because there is only one way to work the land, and that is to be at peace with nature.
Since then, we have focused on essential, everyday foods that can always be found in any home. We believe that organic food, free from any toxic element, must be officially acknowledged as a universal right and readily available to all; our wealth of skills, knowledge, and know-how made us the ultimate reference point for those seeking basic organic foods such as pasta, tomatoes, oil, and legumes.

What are your goals for the future of your company? How do you plan to continue pushing boundaries in food and beverage industry while staying true to your roots?

Today, we need to shift our focus from “organic” to “sustainability,” of which organic is only a part. We want to contribute to the spread of good practices oriented to environmental sustainability and help our customers evolve, offering them products that are concretely helpful and open to change in the pursuit of a more efficient and safe future in the management of resources.

Do you have any upcoming products or innovations that you are particularly excited about?

So, in addition to the fight against poisons, we work on developing innovative products to promote sustainable choices and behaviours with respect to the environment and society, which can enrich our catalogue and anticipate the time to come. For this reason, we have just launched the first organic fermented pasta that cooks in just a few minutes, reducing energy consumption and emissions; we work on products with a lower specific weight (puffed or freeze-dried foods) to reduce the cost of transport without losing nutritional value or flavour.

Similarly, we provide ready or easy-to-prepare meals made with organically grown ingredients and cooked by sustainable techniques (vacuum-cooked or at a low temperature). We also offer plastic-free products, such as pasta straws, Canù, or cutlery in liquid wood, to contribute to the worldwide campaign to increase awareness of the environmental emergency caused by single-use plastics.

What makes your product different? Why should consumers choose your brand?

Canù – the Mediterranean Taste Award 2024 winner – is the first organic and gluten-free pasta straw. It is not a simple, long pasta shape but has been specially developed to be used as a straw: we made several laboratory tests to make it suitable for drinking. As a result, Canù lasts in a cold drink and at room temperature for more than one hour before softening, and it does not change the taste and the colour of the beverages; in fact, we use only certified organic, gluten-free and dye-free flours: this avoids the effect of colour and flavour dispersion while drinking a drink.
Canù is available in several versions, both in lengths and colours (yellow, black, red, green). It is fantastic for cocktails, milkshakes, smoothies and sorbets: cocktails and drinks,, in general, are now actual design creations, and the straw, together with the glass, the leaves, the colours, and everything that comes with it, becomes an integral part of them. Canù is unique and offers the possibility of enhancing the drink’s look; it is a lovely and pure Italian design.
Canù is currently the best alternative to plastic straws and other straws on the market: it is more hygienic than metal straws, lasts longer than paper straws, does not contain glues and does not cause strange sensations on the tongue; moreover, its production is more environmentally friendly then bamboo, paper, PLA straws:

Raw materials are only of Italian origin, so avoiding importation eliminates the related emissions;

Regarding the processing phase Canù, like pasta in general, requires little water and, therefore, has a reduced environmental impact in terms of water resources: in fact, no more than three litres of water are used to produce one kilo of Canù.

Compared to other pasta straws, Canù is produced only in an organic version, because it wants to be a tool against all the poisons dumped in the sea: plastic is only the most conspicuous; the herbicides in the fields, via the rivers reach the sea like plastic but are much more dangerous because they are invisible.
Canù differs from other pasta straws because it is gluten-free, so it can also be used by people who are intolerant or allergic to gluten.
The European Union has already decreed a stop to plastic straws (SUP directive), but the industry is struggling to find suitable answers; thanks to Canù, a response to the growing consumer demand for attention and, therefore, a concrete alternative to waste now exists. Every Canù consumer can make a choice that paves the way toward responsible consumption: Canù is a sign, a step forward that can offer the enlightened consumer the possibility to respect our Planet.

How much has technology helped you, and do your product(s) have sustainable and environmentally friendly characteristics?

Canù is the result of the knowledge of the pasta-maker who has adapted the pasta machine to the specific need for a pasta straw; the ability to make small changes allowed us to achieve the desired result.
To further reduce pollution by not needing to transport straws each time, we want to implement machines to produce straws close to the places of consumption! We will give directly to our customers blends of flour and machines to produce the straws on-site, respecting Canù standards; technology will help us and will provide essential benefits:

• Production will be sustainable, based on actual needs: there will be no longer mass production, with the product stored in warehouses, but production whenever necessary.

• The «pasta maker’s knowledge» will no longer have to be present next to the machines at all times;

• The production will be sustainable, based on actual needs: no longer mass production, with the product then stored in warehouses, but production whenever necessary.

To what degree has climate change affected your production and business development?

The complexity of the challenges we face in saving the Planet often pushes us never to start, to wait for others to save us. CAMPO is not a “spectator, not protagonist” and reacts by starting from the simplest things, rethinking the things closest to us. Our strength lies in recognising new environmental challenges as they emerge, generating solutions, and creating new products because seeking and finding answers means providing products able to favour the evolution of each of us.

CAMPO Società Cooperativa Agricola has received a Gold Award at the 2024 Mediterranean Taste Awards