Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe. It covers an area of 116,347 sq mi and has a largely temperate climate. With 61 million inhabitants,  it is the 4th most populous EU member state.

Italy has the third largest economy in the Eurozone and the eighth largest economy in the world. It has a very high level of human development and plays a prominent role in global military, cultural and diplomatic affairs and is also considered to be a major regional power in Europe. Italy is a founding and leading member of the European Union and the member of numerous international institutions, including the UN, NATO, the OECD, the OSCE, the WTO, the G7/G8, G20.

Italy is regarded as one of the world's most industrialised nations and a leading country in world trade and exports. It is a highly developed country with creative and innovative business, a large and competitive agricultural sector , influential and high-quality automobile, machinery food, design and fashion industry.

Its food industry is well known for the high quality and variety of its products. It is also the world's sixth largest manufacturing country characterised by a smaller number of global multinational corporations. This has produced a manufacturing sector often focused on the export of niche market and luxury products, that if on one side is less capable to compete on the quantity, on the other side is more capable of facing the competition from China and other emerging Asian economies based on lower labour costs, with higher quality products.

The country was the world's 7th largest exporter in 2009. It was the fifth most visited country and the sixth highest tourism earner in the world.