ROME, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- One of Italy's greatest culinary gifts to the world was to be celebrated on Wednesday in the country's capital, Italian News Agency ANSA reported.
The ninth World Pasta Day in Rome is set to shine the spotlight on a huge variety of mouth-watering dishes produced by the nation's unrivalled pasta-makers.
One third of the 11.5 million tonnes of pasta gobbled up around the world every year is produced in Italy, where it is only made from durum wheat flour, according to the Union of Italian Pasta-makers (UNIPI).
"Italy's pasta-making traditions give added value to a quality raw material, durum wheat. Our pasta-makers know how difficult it is to obtain a quality product from just one ingredient," said UNIPI President Mario Rummo.
"This is why Italian pasta recipes and know-how, our special blends of wheat, should be promoted."
Organizers said World Pasta Day 2006 would be a celebration of the versatility of a product that could be prepared in an infinite variety of ways.
Although a key element of gourmet cuisine, part of pasta's appeal is its cheapness, with half a kilo costing as little as a cup of coffee. This means it is also a staple of poor people's diets all over the world.
This year's events included the debut meeting of members of the International Pasta Organization (IPO), which was founded in Barcelona on World Pasta Day last year.
As well as UNIPI, the IPO is composed of producer associations from Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, France, Germany, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, Uruguay, the United States and Venezuela.
It aims to promote the culinary and nutritional benefits of pasta and provide a system through which producers can self-regulate the preparation of quality pasta.
Pasta is a key part of the Mediterranean diet, which, advocates say, has helped give Italy the longest life-expectancy rates in Europe. According to Italian national statistics institute ISTAT; Italian men currently have a life expectancy of 77.4, while Italian women can expect to live to 83.
Italians are the world's biggest consumers of pasta by a long chalk, eating an annual 28 kg per capita compared to second-placed Venezuelans, who eat 12.7 kg, and the Americans, who eat just under seven kg a year.
