No peace for Romagna as a hailstorm damages hundreds of hectares

First the frost, then the excessive rain and then the flood... only hail was missing, and it hit the Romagna area on Jun 23rd, causing considerable damage between Ravenna and Cesena.

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Fellini Patrizio from Gambettola (Forlì-Cesena) has endured considerable damage as "hailstones fell on dozens of hectares, compromising at least one thousand lettuce plants ready for harvesting. Between Gentile, Trocadero, Romana, Canasta and Foglia di Quercia, the damage amounts to around 600,000 plants ready to be harvested over the next few weeks," reports Andrea Pignato, sales manager at Fellini."

"The smallest plants should be able to recover, but they will not be ready before another 15-20 days, causing a gap in supplies."

Photos and video provided by az. Fellini Patrizio

All this happened just when Fellini and other similar companies in Romagna were about to recover from the effects of the flood. Basically, businesses had to bear the costs of preparing the soil, purchasing the plants, transplants, fertilization, treatments and mechanical weeding operations only to have nothing left.

"Our company firmly believes in planning, but it is clear how events such as this one - just like a flood, which is totally unpredictable - make everything useless. But we will not give up: thanks to our new growers, we will continue to suggest planning to big retail chains so as to organize our production and guarantee growers a fair income so that they can work without worries."