The Ministry of the Economy to the rescue of consumers. The latter face food inflation which reached 14.5% over one year in February according to INSEE. To compensate for financial difficulties at the checkout, Bruno Le Maire announced on Monday the launch of an “anti-inflation quarter”, the result of an agreement with distributors who have undertaken to offer the prices “the lowest possible » until June on a selection of products at their discretion.
The device, financed thanks to the margins of the distributors, will cost them “several hundred million euros”, the government also intends to deploy in the coming months a “food check” for the most modest households, he added. following a meeting in Paris with most of the major retailers.
Products chosen by distributors
At the end of this “anti-inflation quarter”, “we will reopen trade negotiations with the major manufacturers so that the fall in wholesale prices, which we are seeing on the markets but which has not yet been passed on to everyday consumption, can be translated” into everyday products, said Bruno Le Maire.
The products that will be sold at the “lowest possible” prices will be “chosen freely” by each of the distributors, the minister specified, and may vary from one region to another. They will be identifiable by a tricolor “anti-inflation quarter” logo. The bulk of commercial operations will relate to private label products, on which brands have the most “latitude” to set prices, said Carrefour CEO Alexandre Bompard.
“I did not wait for a public meeting to be cheaper,” quipped Monday morning on Cnews the boss of the E. Leclerc centers Michel-Edouard Leclerc, who chose to shun the meeting but must speak during the day on the phone with Bruno Le Maire.