In the past th years, 20,000 Parmesan molds worth seven million euros were stolen in the Emilia Romagna region. As a result of the thefts, guarded storage fortresses are being built there to protect the valuable cheese from gangs that specialize in its theft.
In the town of Guastalla, thieves loaded 68 disks of cheese worth 50,000 euros into a van in four minutes. The installed alarm systems stopped working after a short time.
Within two years, 600 tons of Parmesan cheese were stolen. The stolen cheese is later sold illegally, mainly at markets.
