ISTAT data reveals wine is the most consumed alcoholic beverage in Italy, especially by men

Fifty-four point one percent of Italians (over 29 million people) drink a glass of wine at least once a year, while 18.2% (just under 10 million people) drink it every day, revealed ISTAT data from the survey on "Aspects of daily life", in reference to the year 2018, analyzed by WineNews. The survey confirms the fact once again that wine in Italy is predominantly a "male" drink, since 66.3% of men surveyed drink it at least once a year compared to just 42.6% of women. Further, it is an everyday pleasure for 27% of males, while only 9.9% of females partake in this daily pleasure.
In general, therefore, Italians confirm that wine is the most popular alcoholic beverage, considering that 50.4% of people drink beer at least once a year and only 4.8% drink it every day. The percentage rates, obviously, decrease even more so regarding aperitifs, bitters and spirits, which 45.9% of Italians consume at least once, and only by 0.7% every day.
The survey also revealed that 54.5% of drinkers consume wine and other beverages during meals (and for women this percentage rises to 62.7%, compared to 48.4% for men), even though 45.5% drank at least once outside of a meal (and here, too, more men do so, 51.6%, than women, 37.3%).
On the territorial level, the Region boasting the highest percentage of people who consume wine is Emilia Romagna (62.5%), followed by Valle d'Aosta (61%) and Le Marche (60.2%). On the other hand, Sicily is the Region where there is the lowest percentage of wine consumers (43.1%), which follows Campania (45.2%) and also Sardinia (48%).
In terms of geographical areas, the North East is in the lead (60.1%), followed by the Center (57.5%) and then the North West (56%), while people drink less wine in the South (48.9%) and on the Islands (44.4%). The distribution of wine consumers considered by size of the Municipalities, is more or less the same, and that is, the percentages range from 52.8% in the suburbs, which is the lowest figure to 56.9% of the municipalities in metropolitan areas, the highest figure.