Italy's trade agency ICE ran 245 national pavilions abroad and supported 6,560 companies in 2025

The Italian Trade Agency put 245 national pavilions into foreign trade fairs during 2025 and supported 6,560 Italian companies exhibiting at international fairs over the same year. It also worked the flow in the opposite direction, organising 125 incoming delegations at trade fairs held in Italy and bringing 11,500 foreign operators to Italian fairs and related events nationwide. Read together, the four numbers describe a two-sided instrument rather than a simple export subsidy. On the outbound side the agency aggregates small suppliers under a single national banner so that companies too small to book their own stand still appear at the fairs that matter in their sector. On the inbound side the agency pays for qualified buyers to come to Italy, which is what turns an Italian fair into an international one from the exhibitor's point of view. For a foreign buyer, the practical consequence is that hosted-buyer programmes at major Italian fairs are frequently state-funded and worth asking about directly. The figures are ICE's own for 2025.