Prof. Dr. Vera Teresa Foti is an Associate Professor at the Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment, University of Catania, Catania, Italy. She completed her PhD studies in Agricultural Economics and Policy at the University of Catania. She is a winner of the “Robert Schuman” scholarship awarded by the European Parliament (Luxembourg). In addition, she is a member of the Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA) and a member of the Italian Association of Regional Science (AISRe). Her research interests include agri-food marketing; agri-food product quality policy; agro-biodiversity; social farming; and rural and local development policy.