This paper proposes a social accounting matrix (SAM)‐based, counterfactual approach to assess the economy‐wide impact of food fraud in a given country and applies it to the Italian economy. The empirical application uses primary data collected by the authority in charge of the monitoring and repression of fraud in food value chains between the years 2007 and 2015. This is a unique dataset to analyze the issue, although it includes only data on food fraud within the country. The results of the SAM simulations show that the share of economy directly and indirectly linked to the supply of irregular food products accounts for 0.5% of the total value of output and is able to activate up to 156 thousand labor units. The net impact of food fraud on output and employment in the whole economy is negative, with losses averaging up to 1.8 billion euros of output and of 20,000 jobs per year, with a relative impact significantly larger in agriculture than in the food industry. These figures reveal an intrinsic fragility of the agri‐food system, especially in those subsectors featuring relatively large price elasticities such as quality products (e.g., wine, olive oil, cheese). The overall conclusion is that food fraud is not only a source of unfair competition to regular production activities but also has an overall contractionary impact on the whole economy due to its directly unproductive rent‐seeking nature. [EconLit classifications: C67, L66, Q13].

中文翻译：

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评估食品欺诈对整个经济的影响：基于 SAM 的反事实方法

本文提出了一种基于社会核算矩阵 (SAM) 的反事实方法，以评估特定国家食品欺诈对整个经济的影响，并将其应用于意大利经济。实证应用程序使用了 2007 年至 2015 年期间负责监测和打击食品价值链欺诈的主管部门收集的原始数据。这是一个用于分析该问题的独特数据集，尽管它仅包括有关食品欺诈的数据。国家。SAM 模拟的结果表明，与非正规食品供应直接和间接相关的经济份额占总产值的 0.5%，能够激活多达 15.6 万个劳动力单位。食品造假对整个经济的产出和就业的净影响是负面的，平均损失高达 1。80 亿欧元的产值和每年 20,000 个工作岗位，对农业的影响明显大于食品行业。这些数字揭示了农业食品系统的内在脆弱性，特别是在价格弹性相对较大的子行业，例如优质产品（例如葡萄酒、橄榄油、奶酪）。总体结论是，食品造假不仅是正常生产活动不公平竞争的根源，而且由于其直接的非生产性寻租性质，对整个经济产生整体收缩影响。[EconLit 分类：C67、L66、Q13]。尤其是那些价格弹性相对较大的子行业，例如优质产品（如葡萄酒、橄榄油、奶酪）。总体结论是，食品造假不仅是正常生产活动不公平竞争的根源，而且由于其直接的非生产性寻租性质，对整个经济产生整体收缩影响。[EconLit 分类：C67、L66、Q13]。尤其是那些价格弹性相对较大的子行业，例如优质产品（如葡萄酒、橄榄油、奶酪）。总体结论是，食品造假不仅是正常生产活动不公平竞争的根源，而且由于其直接的非生产性寻租性质，对整个经济产生整体收缩影响。[EconLit 分类：C67、L66、Q13]。