Italian students win Federvini contest on responsible drinking

Federvini said on Tuesday that 500 university students from eight Italian campuses had taken part in the fourth edition of “Comunicare il consumo responsabile - Communication is Education,” a project aimed at promoting responsible drinking through campaigns designed by young people for their peers.

The final presentations were held at the congress center of Sapienza University of Rome, where teams from Sapienza, the University of Florence, the University of Campania Luigi Vanvitelli, the University of Verona, the University of Turin, Luiss Business School in Milan and Rome, and the Smea Higher School of Agro-Food Management at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore competed before a jury led by Chiara Soldati, who heads Federvini’s Casa study and intervention center on the social aspects of alcohol consumption.

The winning campaign came from Smea at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. The student team proposed a mix of communication tools focused on moderate wine consumption among young adults, including a traveling bar kiosk, talks with university experts and guided tastings, events paired with fresh pasta from Miscusi restaurants, a promotional reel on MasterChef’s official Instagram page, itinerant podcasts hosted by influencers and urban billboards, including banners on trams. Sapienza placed second and the University of Verona third.

Federvini said all finalists will take part in a prize visit in the coming months to one of its member companies. The winning team will also receive an overnight stay at the host property.

The event opened with remarks from Luca Dezi, director of the CoRiS department at Sapienza, and Alberto Mattiacci, the project’s national scientific coordinator. Speakers also included Cecilia Del Guercio, who oversees communications for the mayor of Rome; Rodolfo Maralli, a marketing professor at Sapienza and sales and marketing director at Banfi; Marco Reitano, head sommelier at La Pergola; and Alessio Di Leo of Sapienza, who cited findings from a Sapienza-Federvini study on Italian drinking habits centered on moderation and conviviality.

Soldati said the initiative had become one of Federvini’s most significant social projects because it combines training, responsibility and dialogue with younger generations. She said the steady rise in participating universities and students showed strong interest in a cultural approach to responsible drinking based on awareness and quality communication.

Mattiacci said the project was built on the idea that communication can serve as a tool for civic and social education. He said it had grown into a national platform linking universities, students and companies while encouraging critical thinking and project skills.

Maralli said that as Italian cuisine gains wider recognition as a cultural asset rooted in balance and conviviality, it is important to support projects that promote moderate alcohol consumption. He said initiatives aimed at university students and built around media they already use offer a practical way to reach people as they prepare to enter the workforce.