2023-09-08 06:01:00
A bill will be presented at the beginning of October. Carrefour promises labels on the products concerned on the shelves “from Monday”. Industrialists denounce hypocrisy.
Smaller products for an equivalent and sometimes even higher price. Shrinkflation, this marketing method used by certain manufacturers to hide the fact that a product has become more expensive, at the risk of misleading the consumer, is increasingly controversial.
“It’s a scam, it’s scandalous,” the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, stormed on Thursday. on France Info. You have less and you pay more. This has always existed, but this practice is increasing. This is unacceptable.”
A provision which will oblige manufacturers to make the reduction in content very visible when they keep the same packaging
To the point that the government has decided to tackle the phenomenon, at a time when inflation is forcing many French people to deprive themselves of certain food products.
“Not here to line the pockets of industrial giants”
A legal text will be presented at the beginning of October with “a provision which will oblige manufacturers to make the reduction in content very visible when they keep the same packaging”, Bruno Le Maire announced on Thursday.
“We are not here to line the pockets of industrial giants. We are here to enable the French to live decently and be able to afford what they need, particularly in terms of food products,” he added.
More reliable information
“I think everyone has understood that my determination to force those who do not respect the rules to comply, to avoid excessive margins and to ensure that inflation falls more quickly, is total,” warned the boss of Bercy, who regularly poses as a defender of the purchasing power of the French.
Guest on the show C dans l’air on France 5, Wednesday evening, the CEO of Carrefour, Alexandre Bompard, also decided to work towards transparency.
Carrefour takes an initiative
“From Monday”, in all stores, there would be “a label on the products on which we have shrinkflation, which will say: this product has seen its container reduced and its price increased”.
“That way, we will have the most reliable information possible for consumers, because it is unacceptable to do that for the consumer,” he denounced.
Supervise commercial negotiations
The Minister of the Economy also clarified on Thursday that he was targeting “early October” for a new text of law governing commercial negotiations between distributors and manufacturers. “There is a more general problem which is to see if indeed the French model where there is an annual negotiation instead of having regular negotiations is the right model”, added Bruno Le Maire, specifying that this “should not never be to the detriment of the income of agricultural producers.
Targeted in this way from all sides, the industrialists nevertheless believe that they are being given a bad case. “To say that there is a scam is very hypocritical. The distributors accepted these products as such,” replies Jean-Philippe André, head of the National Association of Food Industries (Ania).
He considers the practice marginal, but he says he is ready to “further improve consumer information”.
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