(ANSA) - Rome, April 24 - As Italy is gearing up to host Milan's food-themed Universal Exposition in a week, the Lower House has approved a motion for the cabinet to regard food as a fundamental right ahead of the Milan Charter to be drafted at the world's fair.
    The motion approved on Thursday urges the government to consider "including the right to food in the Constitution" and make sure "States take responsibility to guarantee the right to healthy, safe and sufficient food for all, under the Milan Charter", an Italian initiative for a global food agreement.
    The motion also calls on the cabinet to prevent food waste, fight land grabbing, and promote Italian-made and DOP products from strictly defined geographical areas.
    Drafted with the participation of institutions, the academic world and the private sector, the Milan Charter traces guidelines that the Italian government will follow to promote a more sustainable world food system during Expo, which runs from May 1 through October 31.
    The final draft will be handed over to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in October when he visits the world's fair.
    Countries participating in the fair will also sign the Charter.
    Meanwhile Expo organizers announced on Thursday that Uruguay will take part for the first time ever in a Universal Exposition with its own national pavilion in Milan.
    "We couldn't possibly feel more at ease: the theme chosen for Expo - Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life - is already an integral part of the image of Uruguay that we promote internationally," the director of the national investment and export promotion agency Uruguay XXI, Antonio Carambula, told ANSA.
    The three-storey pavilion features the slogan 'Life grows in Uruguay' and hosts a restaurant serving typical grilled food.
    And another Expo participant, the United States, will star 50 of its best chefs who will act as "ambassadors" of American food in an initiative announced this week at a meeting with US Secretary of state John Kerry and Italy's Ambassador in the US, Claudio Bisogniero.
    The US cuisine ambassadors, including White House executive chef Cristeta Comerford, will each be cooking for a few days at the James Beard American Restaurant at the Seven Stars Galleria in the heart of Italy's financial capital - the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II - to showcase all-American specialties.
    The cooks are part of the American Chef Corps initiative set up in 2012 by the State Department and the James Beard Foundation, which was created in 1986 in memory of an American pioneer "foodie", best-selling cookbook author and show host who played a key role in sponsoring local foods and cuisines in America.
    Members of the American Chefs Corps gearing up for Expo have already visited 30 countries worldwide as "cuisine diplomats", including Art Smith who travelled last year to Israel and the Palestinian Territories to meet his local counterparts and foodies.
    And while Iran and the US are hard at work to reach a final agreement on Tehran's nuclear program by June, food diplomacy will also get a unique chance in Milan with the Iranian pavilion located just a few steps away from the US pavilion.
    "It is an occasion for the United States to be close to us", Hossein Esfahbodi, general commissioner for Iran at Expo 2015, told ANSA this week.
    He added that the Iranian pavilion will also be in the vicinity of those of Italy, Chile, Germany and Switzerland.
    At the pavilion, visitors will get a taste of Iran's cuisine and typical products, including dates, pistachios and tea as well as an insight into its tourist attractions through a 165-meter screen with videos on the country and its heritage.
    Japan's pavilion will instead have as its official ambassador Sanrio's best-known animated character Hello Kitty.
    The Japanese-based company said this week that Hello Kitty will accompany visitors on tours of the health, education and entertainment-focused pavilion during Expo.
    Hello Kitty will be decked in a flowered, red kimono with a lime green obi and her trademark red bow for the occasion.
    Indeed Expo 2015 organizers have taken into account the needs of children as well as adults visiting Expo with a Children Park where kids can play educational games on the theme of feeding the planet, organizers said this week.
    The Children Park will have eight play areas for ages 4 to 10 with games including 'Ring around the Planet, Ring around the Future'.
    And the estimated 20 to 25 million visitors expected at the fair will have the opportunity to taste some 26 million meals worth an estimated total of 320 million euros, according to farmers' association Coldiretti.
    Coldiretti added that the Universal Exposition will also give a huge boost to restaurants, pizzerias and other food outlets across Milan serving the additional eight million foreign tourists who will be visiting Italy during the six-month world's fair. Overall, foreign visitors in Italy are expected to spend roughly 1 billion euros on meals and a further 750 million euros on food products, according to a report published by the farmers' association ahead of the event.