Italian truffle hunting has made it onto the UNESCO list of the world's intangible cultural heritage, a UNESCO panel announced in Paris Thursday. Practitioners of the traditional practice put in their bid eight years ago. Farm group Coldiretti said the accolade "is an important step towards defending a system marked by a special relationship with nature in a rite that is rich with anthropological and cultural aspects.

"It is a tradition that is decisive for many mountain rural areas which are disadvantaged from the tourist and gastronomic standpoints". The art of truffle hunting, Coldiretti said, involves a network of around 73,600 practictioners, called 'tartufai', organised into 45 groups in a national federation ranging from 44,000 individual tartufai to 20,000 'free searchers'.