Italy is currently home to more than 600 McDonald's outlets.

American fast-food giant McDonald's plans to open 200 new outlets and hire 12,000 staff in Italy by 2025.

This is what the new chief executive of the McDonald's group in Italy, Dario Baroni, was quoted as saying by the Affari&Finanza business supplement of Italian newspaper La Repubblica on Monday.

Baroni said the McDonald's group sees Italy as "one of the markets with the greatest potential on a global scale."

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McDonald's currently has 630 outlets in Italy, with 25,000 staff, reports Reuters. Baroni says the group's goal is to increase this to 800 restaurants and around 40,000 staff by 2025.

The covid pandemic hit McDonald's which saw its 2020 revenue in Italy drop to €1.4 billion from €1.6 billion the previous year.

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However Baroni said that McDonald's has begun to see "significant growth", pointing to the Take Away and Drive and Delivery services which have gone from "less than 40 per cent to more than 60 per cent" of total sales.

The first McDonald's in Italy opened near the Spanish Steps in Rome in 1986.