Sicily lacks over a thousand pastry chefs, ice cream makers and bakers. A lack of professional figures that comes to light in the days preceding the Easter holidays, when the consumption of traditional products comes to the fore and in particular those of the confectionery sector, a sector with a high artisan vocation.
The data emerges from a study by the economic observatory of Confartigianato Sicilia which shows that on our island there are 1,160 artisan pastry chefs, ice cream makers and canners and artisan bakers and pasta makers missing, 62% of the 1,870 expected to join (Excelsior data Unioncamere).
La Porta, “Difficulty in sourcing is a long-standing problem”
“The difficulty of recruiting is a problem that we have been experiencing for years in almost all artisan sectors – says Daniele La Porta, president of Confartigianato Sicilia –, micro and small businesses face great inconvenience in recruiting qualified personnel. The data provided by our Observatory cannot help but alarm us and it is a good idea to take action by investing more in education, professional training and apprenticeships”.
On the Easter table there will be 279 traditional Sicilian products thanks to the offer of over 5 thousand artisan businesses.
The photograph of the economic observatory
In Sicily, 7,319 pastry shops and companies in the confectionery sector are affected by the typical consumption of Easter products – a sector that includes fresh pastries, ice cream, biscuits, cocoa, chocolate, confectionery, etc. – with a high artisan vocation: there are 5,510 artisan businesses, representing 75.3% of the total businesses in the sector. Greater presence of artisan pastry shops and confectionery companies in the provinces of Enna (83.3%), Agrigento (81.6%), Trapani (77.8%) and Syracuse (77.1%).
Pastry prices continue to rise
Pastry prices continue to rise. Despite the persistence of some tensions on the costs of raw materials, a slowdown in the dynamics of pastry prices is observed. For sugar in 2023 there was an increase of 28.4% on an annual basis, while cocoa prices on international markets in February 2024 more than doubled (+107.9%) compared to a year earlier.
In the Easter period, if we consider the three-year period 2021-2024, the prices of fresh pastries grew by 10.9%, less than half the prices of food products (+21.2%) and the prices of packaged pastries (+23, 6%).
At Easter with traditional products
The Easter table with traditional products. The biodiversity of Sicilian agri-food production, with a high artisanal vocation, is expressed in 279 traditional agri-food products, characterized by processing, conservation and seasoning methods consolidated over time (Ministry of Agriculture, Food Sovereignty and Forests, 2023b).
Analyzing by type, fresh pasta and bakery, biscuit, pastry and confectionery stand out with 94 products, equal to 33.7% of the total, followed by 83 vegetable products in their natural or processed state, equal to 29.7% of the total and 37 gastronomy products, equal to 13.3%: these three types of products concentrate a good 76.7% of the total.
