The Hidden Cost of Made in Italy
Marianna Tandura
July 6, 2026

Nearly 600,000 workplace accidents were reported in Italy in 2025, while almost 800 people never returned home after going to work. In recent months, the country has watched prosecutors investigate Glovo over alleged labour exploitation and the government intensifying its efforts to combat child labor, and the devastating wildfires in Calabria once again expose the vulnerability of many seasonal agricultural workers living and working in precarious conditions. At first glance, these appear to be separate stories but in reality, they all point to the same structural weakness.

Labour exploitation in Italy is rarely the result of a lack of regulation. More often, it survives because responsibility is fragmented across increasingly complex labour supply chains, making accountability difficult to establish precisely where the greatest risks emerge. Nowhere is this contradiction more evident than in agriculture.

The wine sector, one of the flagship industries in Italy, and one of the strongest symbols in the world of Made in Italy, is no exception. Behind internationally recognised labels lies a highly fragmented production system that relies heavily on sub-contracting and seasonal labour. If Made in Italy is to mean excellence, then it must also ensure dignity and protection for the workers who make that excellence possible. Labour exploitation in Italy's agriculture sector has long been known and is heavily legislated in principle but despite an ever-more sophisticated legal infrastructure one important element of the system still does not undergo serious investigation: the actors responsible for providing the workforce.

This is particularly evident in the wine supply chain, where a significant share of agricultural activities is outsourced to third-party contractors. As work moves through successive layers of subcontracting, responsibility for working conditions becomes increasingly blurred. Legal obligations remain formally in place, but enforcing them becomes considerably more difficult precisely where labour is recruited, organised and managed.

The challenge, therefore, is not necessarily a lack of regulation, but rather where that regulation is directed.

Over the past decade, Italy has developed a wide range of instruments to tackle labour exploitation, including national legislation, regional protocols and local partnerships involving labour inspectors, municipalities, employers' organisations and trade unions. Among these, the Rete del Lavoro Agricolo di Qualità (RLAQ), established within the National Social Security Institute (INPS), has become the country's principal mechanism for identifying compliant agricultural enterprises.

Yet this is also where the system reveals one of its most significant blind spots.

The RLAQ evaluates agricultural enterprises, but not the third-party contractors (contoterzisti) who frequently recruit, organise and supervise the workforce. Ironically, the actors exercising some of the greatest influence over workers' everyday conditions often receive the least regulatory attention. For many seasonal workers, the contractor, not the vineyard is the person who hires them, assigns their work and determines their daily conditions, yet this remains one of the least scrutinised links in the entire supply chain.

Experiences across Italian regions reflect this imbalance. While some territories have begun experimenting with mechanisms that indirectly influence the selection of labour providers, the vast majority of initiatives remain focused on inspections, sanctions and worker protection once exploitation has already occurred. In other words, Italy's current approach remains largely reactive. It responds to abuse rather than reducing the conditions that allow abuse to emerge in the first place.

A particularly interesting attempt to address this gap can be found in the Province of Treviso. Within the framework of the territorial section of the Rete del Lavoro Agricolo di Qualità, local actors have developed a checklist for agricultural subcontracting that functions as a screening tool for third-party contractors. Before awarding a contract, agricultural enterprises may require prospective contractors to provide a self-declaration confirming compliance with social security obligations, collective agreements and other key legal requirements.

Although this does not constitute a formal certification system, it introduces something that is largely absent from the broader Italian framework: prevention. Rather than intervening after exploitation has taken place, the Treviso model seeks to identify risks before workers even enter the production chain. In doing so, it partially fills a regulatory gap left open at both the national and regional levels.

A different, but equally noteworthy, approach has emerged in Piedmont. Here, efforts have focused less on procedural controls and more on reputation. Initiatives involving wine producers, chambers of commerce and local consortia aim to strengthen transparency and promote ethical supply chains by recognising enterprises that comply with labour standards. Reputation itself becomes a form of governance, encouraging responsible business practices through market recognition rather than legal obligation alone.

These initiatives demonstrate that alternative approaches are possible. Yet they remain the exception rather than the rule.

Across most Italian regions, labour exploitation continues to be addressed primarily through governance mechanisms, coordination platforms and projects centred on worker protection, housing and labour market intermediation. These initiatives are undoubtedly valuable and often succeed in mitigating the consequences of exploitation. What they rarely do, however, is intervene at the point where exploitation most often begins: the selection of those who recruit and manage the workforce.

This reveals a broader structural limitation within Italy's approach to labour exploitation in agriculture. Existing legal standards provide an essential foundation, but they cannot achieve their full potential unless they are complemented by practical mechanisms capable of strengthening accountability throughout the labour supply chain.

Public debate understandably focuses on what happens after exploitation is uncovered after the accident, the investigation or after the court case. Yet the more important question is what happens long before any of these events occur, when contractors are selected and workers first enter the supply chain.

If Made in Italy is to remain synonymous with excellence, the conversation cannot end with the quality of the final product. It must also include the conditions under which that product is made. Strengthening accountability at the point where labour enters the supply chain is not simply a technical regulatory reform; it is an essential step towards ensuring that Italian excellence is measured not only by what the world consumes, but also by how it is produced.