Where to buy kava in Italy (and is it legal?)

· 5 min read

By the kava.fyi editorial team · Last updated:

Kava in Italy: what you are really asking

If you are in Italy trying to work out whether kava is legal and where to actually source it, the useful thing to know upfront is that Italy took action in stages: first against herbal use products, then against homeopathic ones, and separately against kava as a food supplement ingredient. None of that makes kava a controlled substance in the way drugs are controlled, but it does mean the products you might expect to find on a pharmacy or herbalist shelf are not there.

This guide lays out what the Italian Ministry of Health has actually said and when, then moves on to the vendors in our neutral, unranked list that ship to Italy, what separates a decent kava product from a poor one, and whether Italy has any documented kava bars.

Legal status in Italy

Kava is not classified as a narcotic or psychotropic substance in Italy: neither kavain nor the Piper methysticum plant appears in the schedules controlled under Article 14 of Presidential Decree 309/90 (the Italian consolidated law on drugs), a point confirmed by the Istituto Superiore di Sanita (ISS), Italy's national public health institute, in its reference monograph on kava-kava. That means simple possession is not treated as a drug offence. Sale is a different matter. The ISS monograph records that the Ministero della Salute (Ministry of Health) first suspended the sale of all kava-kava products marketed for herbal use, and then, by a decree of 29 May 2002 published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale, General Series, No. 141 of 18 June 2002, banned the sale of homeopathic products containing kava-kava. Separately, the Ministry of Health has placed Piper methysticum on its list of plant extracts not permitted in food supplements, a list maintained under the ministerial framework that now sits within the Decree of 10 August 2018 on botanicals in food supplements.

Put together, that means kava cannot lawfully be sold in Italy as a homeopathic remedy, an herbal-use product, or an ingredient in a food supplement. It also cannot be sold as an ordinary food ingredient under EU law regardless of Italy's own measures, because Piper methysticum has no novel food authorisation in the European Commission's Novel Food status catalogue, and any ingredient without one cannot be placed on the market as food anywhere in the EU. Nothing here changes the position on personal possession described above, and none of it is a statement about bringing small personal quantities across a border, which this guide does not address. Check the Ministry of Health's current list before relying on any product's Italian legal status.

Where to buy kava that ships to Italy

No vendor pays to appear in this list and the order below is by price per kilogram, cheapest first, using the low end of each vendor's published range. One vendor, Kavaha, is operated by the same people who run this site; it is listed on the same terms as every other vendor and is not recommended above the others. Prices were read from each vendor's own site on the date shown and can move at any time, so check the vendor's page before you order. See the full, sortable comparison at /products.

What to look for before you buy

Not all kava on the market is the same, and the differences matter more than the price per kilogram. Look for a noble cultivar rather than a tudei (two day) variety: noble kavas have a chemotype dominated by kavain and methysticin and are the varieties traditionally consumed for everyday use in the Pacific, while tudei kavas carry higher levels of flavokavain B and are associated with longer-lasting, heavier after effects. Read up on cultivars so you know what you are ordering, and on effects so your expectations match the plant rather than marketing copy.

Grind matters too. Traditional grind is the whole dried root or a coarse powder meant to be kneaded in water through a strainer bag; micronised powder is ground fine enough to be shaken directly in water without straining; instant kava is a spray dried extract that dissolves on contact. Each method changes strength, speed of onset and how much sediment ends up in the cup, so read the preparation guide before you decide which one suits you. Whichever you choose, a vendor that publishes third party lab results, ideally testing for kavalactone content and for flavokavain B, gives you more to go on than one that does not; treat a published certificate of analysis as a basic sign of transparency, not a guarantee of anything else.

Kava is metabolised by the liver, and drinking alcohol or taking medication that is also broken down by the liver alongside it is not advisable, so if you take regular liver-metabolised medication speak to a doctor or pharmacist before starting kava.

Kava bars in Italy

Our map data does not currently list any kava bars in Italy. If that changes, they will appear on /map, which we keep updated as new venues are documented.

Sources

  1. Piper methysticum (kava-kava), Istituto Superiore di Sanita, monografia di riferimento
  2. Sostanze e preparati vegetali, Ministero della Salute
  3. Novel Food status catalogue, European Commission
  4. Kava Club, shipping coverage statement naming Italy