With food inflation still close to 15% over one year, the government is bringing together representatives of large retailers on Thursday, May 11. The idea is to extend the anti-inflation quarter on the shelves, and eventually initiate price renegotiations.
Now is the time for summer. The government will receive this Thursday, in Bercy, representatives of large retailers with the aim of negotiating the extension of the anti-inflation quarter, set up in early March, franceinfo learned from a government source. Faced with a rise in food prices above 15% over one year in April, the government wishes to discuss with distributors and the agri-food industry the possibility of extending the price reductions on certain products beyond June. in supermarkets.
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Small committee
After inviting distributors to lower prices on a selection of products from March to June as part of the “anti-inflation quarter”, the government is considering new ways to cushion the shock of food inflation beyond the first semester. According to the office of the Minister Delegate in charge of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises, Trade, Crafts and Tourism, Olivia Grégoire, it was not possible to invite all the representatives of large retailers. Michel Biéro, executive purchasing director of Lidl, is not invited. The Federation of Commerce and Distribution (FCD) must represent the absentees (but of which Lidl is not a part).
This meeting comes because, according to Bercy, there is no drop in inflation in sight: the objective is therefore to extend the anti-inflation quarter at least until the start of the school year. Because the system works assures the Ministry of the Economy: products at tight prices have even fallen by less 13% in a month and a half and the French have benefited from it. They have started to buy a little meat, fish, fruit and vegetables again, which they were abandoning in the face of too high prices.
On this principle, the government would also slip a few school supplies into this anti-inflation cart, even if, traditionally, there is no lack of promotions at the start of the school year.
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Low prices this summer?
Still, the fall in prices is not really for now. But the participants in this meeting however slip that “low prices” are well planned for the summer season, if only to play competition between brands. A brand does not really have the choice of raising its prices on its own. But the distributors say it: for each one, this anti-inflation quarter costs several tens of millions of euros, exclusively deducted from the margins. So, to continue this effort, we need a new distribution of costs, as explained by Thierry Cotillard, the boss of the Musketeers (Intermarché, Netto) guest of franceinfo.
“It hits”And “you have to cover as many products as possible“, he said, before insisting: “70% of French people take one in five products from this selection. We are going to extend the operation, but the condition is that the manufacturers participate in the effort“.
How Bercy intends to find a solution
There remains a fundamental question: does the ministry have the means to put everyone back at the negotiating table? Because this meeting remains in a small committee: the Ministry of the Economy promises to receive suppliers very quickly, but avoiding mixing those who have been torn during the last trade negotiations. However, the latter would gladly share the efforts with the industrialists, at the heart of the discussions. Moreover, the hypermarkets have split a letter to ask their suppliers to reopen these famous negotiations without response for the moment.
In theory, it is possible to reopen trade negotiations, this is what Bercy is asking for
because prices are falling sharply for certain raw materials: wheat, rapeseed, or even energy, transport. Admittedly, but on the industrial side, on the contrary, we point to increases for sugar, cocoa, coffee which are soaring or even oranges, tomatoes and also glass. Conclusion of the suppliers: if the tariffs were to be renegotiated, it would rather be on the rise.
After a polite request to resume discussions on prices in the event of ill will, Bercy threatens to make “name and shame“: to put it plainly, publish the names of the big brands which refuse to negotiate downwards for very bad publicity. If that’s not enough, Bercy keeps the fiscal weapon under the elbow: sanctions for the most recalcitrant. In the eyes of the great industrialists, that would be adding fuel to the fire.