Police in Modena, Italy have arrested 10 people on Mar. 20, in one of their biggest wine and cheese busts in recent history.
Police say Operation Wine and Cheese was aimed at breaking up a ring believed responsible for the theft of $250,000 worth of fine wine and Parmesan cheese since 2015.
Police said the operation was launched in co-operation with local prosecutors in the region of Emilia-Romagna. The region is a target of organized crime because it is home to Parmesan, a valuable commodity, police say. A single wheel of cheese can sell for more than $500.
“There have been so many thefts,” officer Alessandro Vaccari told CBS news. “Cheese is a bit like gold here, the price is so high.”
Since 2015, police said more than 16,000 bottles of wine worth $140,000 and 168 wheels of Parmesan worth $110,000 have been stolen. But the problem of cheese and fine food theft extends across Italy, experts say.
“It is unfortunate and a detriment to one of the most famous Italian cheeses in the world,” Coldiretti, an agriculture organization told local news agencies.
“In the last three years, close to 10 million euros worth of Parmesan has been robbed with more than 20,000 cheese wheels stolen from factories, warehouses, distributors and supermarkets.”
Police say those who were arrested in Operation Wine and Cheese are mostly Italian but two are Serbian citizens.