Consorzio Italia del Vino and Luiss Business School have launched the 2026 Wine Business Program, a training initiative designed to prepare emerging professionals for a wine industry facing changing skill requirements. The program combines business education with company-led training and internships, with digitalization, artificial intelligence and sustainability among the subjects covered.
Italy’s wine industry is looking to strengthen its talent pipeline as employers face a widening gap between the skills they need and those available in the labor market. The 2026 Wine Business Program, launched by Consorzio Italia del Vino in partnership with Luiss Business School, is designed to address that challenge by combining management education with practical experience inside wine companies.
The second edition of the program brings 16 selected participants to Luiss Business School’s Villa Blanc campus in Rome from September through November. The curriculum covers areas including marketing and communications, exports, financial management and strategy, while also examining technologies and business trends reshaping the sector, including artificial intelligence, digitalization and sustainability.
The program is aimed primarily at students approaching graduation and recent graduates seeking careers in the wine industry. After completing the classroom phase, participants will undertake four-month internships with consortium member and partner companies. Each participant will also develop a Project Work based on their experience, which will be presented and evaluated during the program’s final session in April 2027.
That structure reflects a broader shift in employer-led workforce development. Rather than treating higher education and recruitment as separate processes, the Wine Business Program brings companies into curriculum design and classroom teaching while creating a direct pathway into workplace experience.
The timing is significant for Italy’s wider labor market. According to the Excelsior Information System of Unioncamere and Italy’s Ministry of Labour and Social Policies, Made in Italy supply chains could require more than 900,000 workers between 2026 and 2029, representing roughly one-third of projected demand. Within the agri-food sector, 38.6% of planned hires were considered difficult to fill in 2025. That proportion had risen to 42% by June 2026, according to the figures supplied for the program.
Young workers represent another important part of the equation. The same June 2026 data indicated that around 190,000 planned agri-food hires, or 30% of the total, were intended for people under 30.
For HR and workforce leaders, the numbers illustrate a familiar challenge: employers increasingly need candidates who combine industry-specific knowledge with transferable digital and commercial capabilities. In wine, that means traditional product expertise increasingly sits alongside international market knowledge, marketing, finance, sustainability and technology skills.
AI is adding another layer to those requirements. While generative AI and automation are increasingly appearing across marketing, analytics, customer engagement and business operations, companies still need employees who understand how to apply those tools within specific industries. For specialist sectors such as wine, that creates demand for professionals who can bridge domain knowledge and technology rather than simply operate either in isolation.
The program’s company involvement is therefore central to its workforce-development model. Professionals from participating businesses will contribute to classroom instruction, while member and partner companies will provide internships. That creates opportunities for employers to expose students to real commercial challenges while giving participants experience that cannot be replicated through classroom learning alone.
The approach also reflects the evolution of corporate learning and development. Employers are increasingly looking beyond conventional training courses toward skills-based development, apprenticeships, project-based learning and partnerships with universities and business schools. Such models can help organizations identify potential talent earlier while allowing educational institutions to adjust curricula around changing employer requirements.
Roberta Corrà, president of Consorzio Italia del Vino, said the industry needs more than simply to attract young people. In her view, candidates need managerial, commercial and digital skills alongside product expertise, international-market knowledge, sustainability awareness and familiarity with new technologies.
Luiss Business School Dean Raffaele Oriani similarly emphasized the role of continuous dialogue with companies in designing education programs. The objective, according to the school, is to reduce the gap between skills demanded by businesses and those currently developed through education and training.
The Wine Business Program sits within Consorzio Italia del Vino’s broader Wine Business Academy initiative. Gate 39 and Veronafiere are supporting partners, while Wine Enthusiast and Colangelo & Partners are participating as media and PR partners.
The consortium itself represents 24 Italian wine companies operating across 17 regions. Its members collectively generate more than €1.5 billion in revenue, operate approximately 15,000 hectares of vineyards and employ more than 3,500 people directly, according to the organization.
For HR teams across the wine and wider agri-food industries, the program highlights a potential response to persistent recruitment difficulties: build talent pipelines around the skills businesses expect to need rather than waiting for those capabilities to emerge organically in the labor market.
For the participants, the model offers a combination of formal management education, industry exposure and workplace experience. For participating companies, it provides a structured opportunity to help shape the professional profiles entering the sector.
As AI, sustainability and digital commerce continue to alter how consumer industries operate, specialist sectors such as wine face a dual workforce challenge: preserving deep industry knowledge while developing professionals capable of working with new technologies and increasingly international business models. Programs that connect employers and education directly are becoming one mechanism for addressing that transition.
Market Landscape
The Wine Business Program reflects several major HR technology and workforce-development trends: skills-based hiring, employer-led education, digital upskilling, AI literacy and experiential learning.
Traditional degree credentials are increasingly being complemented by practical projects, internships and role-specific capabilities. For specialist industries, these models can help employers communicate changing skills requirements to educational institutions while giving students clearer exposure to actual workplace expectations.
The wine industry’s situation also illustrates the broader skills-shortage challenge facing European employers. Digital transformation is expanding demand for workers who can combine sector expertise with data, AI, sustainability and commercial skills.
For HR technology providers, this creates opportunities around skills intelligence, talent marketplaces, learning platforms, applicant tracking, workforce planning and internal mobility.
Top Insights
- Industry-led learning: Wine companies are involved in curriculum design, teaching and internships, connecting academic preparation directly with employer requirements.
- AI enters wine careers: The curriculum treats artificial intelligence and digitalization as emerging business capabilities alongside marketing, finance, exports and strategy.
- Skills gap remains significant: Agri-food employers reported that 42% of planned hires were difficult to fill by June 2026.
- Young talent is central: Around 190,000 planned agri-food hires in June 2026 were intended for workers under 30.
- Experiential learning matters: Four-month internships and project work give participants practical exposure alongside formal management education.
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