The eighth edition of the Pesto World Championship will take place on Saturday 20 March in a totally digital form for safety reasons and to allow the participation of all competitors.

The Palatifini Association and the Genoa Chamber of Commerce, with the institutional partners of the Liguria Region and the Municipality of Genoa, confirm the event in a digital version: a sign of resilience against the negative economic situation caused by the pandemic. The event will start at 10 am with the live streaming of the finalists from Palazzo Ducale on the Zoom platform, who will be contacted in these days to confirm their availability. Those who cannot connect live, due to the time zone or other impediments, will be allowed to recover via smartphone, with the help of friends and relatives, while making pesto with a mortar, at home or in the workplace, in the days preceding Saturday 20 March. The amateur submissions will be edited in a video that will be streamed during the race. All the participants live and remotely will be sent the products needed to make Genoese Pesto and the traditional gadgets of the Championship, which will be mandatory to wear. The performance will be greeted by the authorities, followed by the traditional hymn of the Championship sung by the children’s choir of a Genoese school. During the production time of the mortar pesto (about half an hour) animations and images of Genoa and its excellences, not just food, will be inserted. The public will be able to interact by sending messages and answering questions throughout the entire period, making the event, as far as possible, the popular festival it has always been.

The “winners” of this extraordinary edition will symbolically be Pesto Genovese itself, the city’s number One ambassador (in 2020 it was mentioned in the media and social networks around the world over 172,000 times, 62% of which abroad), and its Championship, manifestation of unity and universal sharing of the values ​​of quality of life and tradition. When conditions allow, the race will be repeated in presence to designate the next champion. In this edition there are three collateral events. The first will be the conference call of some Genoese, Italian and foreign chefs on Genoese pesto, the second is the award ceremony of the international competition “Pestochampionship Mascotte” organized by the Department of Commerce and Major Events of the Municipality of Genoa, the third is represented from the traditional assignment of the “A Compagna” association recognition plaque for the person who “tramples from further away”.