Is the tricolor flag on the packaging enough to make us understand that we are buying original Italian food? 2 out of 3 Italian products sold abroad are counterfeit.

Not every product sold in stores or online are authentic Italian products, but how do you know if we are buying a real Italian product or a counterfeit?

An easier way is to check the barcode on the package, it's called EAN, on this code you will see several bars and thirteen digits located on the base. The first two or three digits indicate the country where the coding was requested by the product brand holder (Italy has a number from 80 to 83), the next 4 or 5 digits is the manufacturer's identifier, the next 5 digits is the product identifier, the last number serving as a checksum.

So if you want to know if you are buying an authentic Italian product, you should check if the number at the bottom of the barcode starts with 80, 81, 82 or 83.