In the lexicon of international economics, ‘dumping’ is not a tropical disease, but an unfair trade practice.

It means selling a product abroad at a lower price than normally charged on the domestic market, or even below production costs.
It is a strategy often used to penetrate a foreign market, gain market share and put competitors out of business.

In response, countries that feel aggrieved can apply ‘anti-dumping’ duties, which are additional tariffs designed to bring the price of the imported product down to a normal level that does not harm local businesses.
It is not a trade war, nor is it protectionism: it is a mechanism regulated by international rules, provided for by the WTO (World Trade Organisation). It is a form of arbitration between competition and distortion.

What is happening in the United States with Italian pasta – and which has stirred our politicians theatrically – fits perfectly into this pattern. However, as often happens in Italy, reality is staged like a comedy that has already been seen: you take a technical fact and package it up like a prime-time TV drama, ready for those who pretend to understand and those who hope to confuse.

Giuseppe Conte evoked Donald Trump’s return as the prologue to an attack on our culinary sovereignty, gravely announcing a 107% tariff on Italian pasta.
Riccardo Magi of Più Europa echoed, denouncing a dark American strategy to favour imitations and force us to relocate.

But the truth is that the US Department of Commerce – a technical and not a political body – months ago launched (when Trump had not yet been elected) an investigation at the request of local companies. Not against Italy, but on some Italian companies. In particular, La Molisana and Garofalo.

According to the prosecution, they allegedly sold pasta in the United States at prices considered abnormally low. In the absence of documentary cooperation – that is, incomplete data – a provisional measure was triggered: an anti-dumping duty of 91.74%.
Add to this a 15% duty already in force on all European pasta, and there you have the infamous 107%.

This is not a coup against penne rigate. It is standard procedure, laid down in the rules that we, as the European Union, also apply in similar circumstances. But Giuseppe Conte and co. pretend they don’t know, or even worse, they know and pretend it is someone else’s fault anyway.

What is really disturbing is not the American measure, but the Italian reaction: hysterical and rather sly.
One cries out for US protectionism, but is silent on the fact that some companies have chosen not to provide sufficient documentation, effectively triggering the punitive treatment.
There is talk of ‘forced delocalisation’ but then it turns out that Italian managers are seriously considering opening a plant in the US, as if the investigation was just an excuse for a decision already in the pipeline.

The blame, in short, always lies with others. First the Chinese, then the Americans who – look at that – apply the same market rules that we only invoke when it suits us. And when someone, across the Atlantic, tries to do the maths in our pockets, instead of responding with numbers, we prefer to alarm the public on social media with prêt-à-publier indignation.