President Meloni’s speech at Leonardo Awards ceremony

Thank you, and good afternoon. My thanks to President [of the Leonardo Committee] Dompé for this invitation, for his work, and also for what he has said to me, and to us, today. My greetings to Vice-President [of the Council of Ministers] Tajani and Minister Urso, as well as to President [of Confindustria] Orsini and President [of the Italian Trade Agency] Zoppas, and I also wish to greet and thank all the companies involved in the Leonardo Prize. I think we need initiatives like this, and the fact you consistently renew this event is particularly important, which is also why I decided to be here, despite this being a rather complex week.

A few days ago, at Palazzo Chigi, we held the Master of the Art of Italian Cuisine awards ceremony, a prize created by this Government (it strangely didn’t exist before). This was therefore also a message to say that occasions like these need to be multiplied, not merely for the sake of a celebration, which would in any case be important, but as an example, a lesson. During that ceremony, I referred to a Latin proverb that I like very much, which says Verba movent, exempla trahunt – words move us, but examples drive us forward. And that is precisely what we need, because the stories we have honoured today – and those we may not be honouring today but form part of Italy’s history of excellence – are stories of men and women who have shown above all one thing: that the only real limits are the ones we decide to believe in, and if we don’t allow others, or also often ourselves, to tell us what the limits imposed on us are, if we decide to try and overcome those limits, well, ladies and gentlemen, then it can be possible to succeed.

You need to be consistent, ready to make sacrifices and able to question yourself and not look for excuses, because it happens that people also look for excuses when things don’t go well. We must remember that the majority of what we manage to do in our lives depends mainly on us. Then, of course, the institutions are needed, answers are needed, politics is needed.

We are trying to do our best – and I thank those who mentioned this – in order to strengthen our system’s competitiveness, but if entrepreneurs didn’t then have faith, then our work would also be useless, just as it would be much more difficult for entrepreneurs to carry out their work if politics didn’t decide to stand by their side. I have done my best over the last 2.5 years, also by travelling all over the world. Why? Because I know that when I open a door, I have the ‘Sistema Italia’ following me, arriving, which is able to do the other part of the job. So, no, it isn’t foreign policy, because it is often said that “President Meloni works a lot on foreign policy”; it is not foreign policy, it is domestic policy. It is about the ability and the opportunity to open up new spaces. 

However, we also need to convey this lesson, the lesson provided by such incredible, extraordinary stories, that seem like something out of a film, because by telling these stories, we also help many others to understand that it is possible. Stories like the one of Pietro Ferrero: I imagine that when Pietro Ferrero began producing his “giandujot” spread in his workshop, which he distributed himself in his Fiat Topolino, he could never have imagined that one day the Italian Prime Minister would gift a jar of Nutella to the King of England, as I did last week. One of our many iconic products, but I gifted it together with a card containing this present’s ‘instructions for use’. The card more or less said something like this: on a rainy Sunday, should you be feeling a little down, put on your best pyjamas, sit on the sofa, watch that TV series you’ve been wanting to see for a long time, take a spoon, open this present and you’ll feel better.

It is a way of saying that Italian products make their mark globally because they are good for you, because they are also good for the soul; a way of saying that Italian products are not successful because they are more competitive on price, but rather because they are unbeatable on quality. This is also what we need to be aware of, because we know we are in tough times, and we’ll see how things go in the coming hours – as you can imagine, I don’t feel any pressure at all regarding the two days I have ahead of me… we’ll certainly do our best as always; I am aware of what I represent and I am aware of what I am defending. Let’s see how the situation we are in develops, but let’s also remember that we have the strength, the ability, the intelligence and the creativity to overcome any obstacle. We have overcome much worse obstacles. We just need to remember that, when an Italian product is exported, most of the wealth it produces is not in Italy, but is rather produced where it is exported to. With our work linked to exports, we therefore also produce wealth for others too, and it is a good thing for everyone to continue dealing with Italy, because Italy is able to produce well-being, excellence and wealth.

We can only do this together, and we will continue to do so together.

Thank you.

[Courtesy translation]