The aim of this work is to contribute to the definition of an analytical approach to evaluate the dynamics in progress in the agricultural and agro-food sector development at local and regional levels. Special care will be devoted to examining the role played by the regional Institutions in determining higher levels of competitiveness for typical and quality products in the new EU scenery. The auxiliary statistical methodology adopted here consists in cluster analysis preceded by principal components analysis. Starting from a wide set of indicators, which is assumed to be sufficient to describe the territorial system, the principal components analysis allows to synthesise such a set into a reduced number of uncorrelated components. The components are then utilised in the cluster analysis in order to identify the agricultural systems on the territory. Then, the relevance of typical and quality productions in each territorial system can be analysed. A case study on Emilia-Romagna region is presented. The region is characterised by a high level of development and an important agricultural productivity. This study mainly highlighted the role played by standard requirements of some typical and quality productions that enable to reach a higher competitiveness in the new national and European contexts. The role that the regional institutions will play is also examined throughout the paper. The function of public support, programming and developing initiatives at a local level is discussed.