The Government has asked manufacturers and supermarkets to return to the negotiating table to lower prices on the shelves “whenever it is objectively justified”, according to a letter revealed by the echoes Thursday night and consulted by AFP.
The Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, and the Delegate Minister of Commerce, Olivia Grégoire, have asked supermarkets and their industrial suppliers to “voluntarily register” in a “perspective of infra-annual renegotiation of contracts” that determines the conditions of sale of the food products that eventually fill the shelves. of supermarkets
Objective: “that the transfer prices be revised downwards whenever this is objectively justified”, write the ministers who ask the manufacturers to “examine with the greatest attention the requests for renegotiation that will be transmitted to them from the first symptoms of falling inflation upstream”. “.
“We urge distributors to ensure that any price reduction that may result from this renegotiation is returned to consumers when the time comes, in full and without delay”, say Bruno Le Maire and Olivia Grégoire in this letter addressed in particular to Ania, the main employers’ organization for the food industry, and at Ilec, which represents many manufacturers selling under a national brand (such as Nestlé, Danone or L’Oréal).
Lower wholesale prices
L’Ania indicated on Thursday night that it had “taken note of this letter that recalls what is already provided for in the contracts.” They include, according to her, “renegotiation or review clauses” that provide for renegotiation if the price reductions are “verified and objectified for the companies.” The government announced at the beginning of March that a reopening of these negotiations would take place during 2023, “so that the drop in wholesale prices that we see in the markets” is also “translated” on the shelves, Bruno Le Maire said.
Every year, supermarkets negotiate with their suppliers the conditions under which they will buy their production for next year, which will fill the store shelves. The latest negotiations to date, completed on March 1, painfully resulted in an average increase of around 10% in the prices supermarkets pay manufacturers, to take into account the increase in their production costs (energy, transport , raw materials, packaging). , etc.), according to both sides.
In mid-March, the president of System U Dominique Schelcher had called on the government to reform this system, hoping that the discussion would be “permanent between producers and traders to take into account the evolution of the price of raw materials.”
Source: BFM TV
