04/12/2021 7:47 PM
Clarín.com
Economy
Updated 04/12/2021 7:47 PM
With inflation still in the area of 4% per month, the Government decided to extend the
Care Prices program
until July
12
, with an average increase of 4.8% in the values of those that were already included in the scheme, reported this late the Ministry of Productive Development.
Thus, the basket of representative products for local mass consumption will now contain 670 products, ten more than in the previous version.
This time, more items were incorporated to protect against Covid, such as a
plastic protective mask.
The program already included products such as alcohol gel, soaps, antibacterial cleansers and gloves.
In addition, new varieties of food are added such as
pasta, cookies, puddings and spices
from first and second brands.
Thus, the program has a total of 670 products that are sold nationwide in all the branches of the main chains.
The Secretariat, led by Paula Español, highlighted that since the relaunch in January of this year, the program
increased
the number of references by
more than 65%
and has more than double the number of products it had at the beginning of 2020.
More controls
The extension of this program comes amid an increase in tension between the private sector and the Government over the mechanisms used to
control prices.
Last week the Ministry of Internal Trade applied various sanctions for non-compliance and determined that companies are obliged to work at
100% of their capacity.
It also renewed another program, Maximum Prices, which, unlike Prices Care, which is consensual, is defined by the Government
unilaterally
.
In that extension, which will be until May 31, no type of increase was authorized.
In recent weeks it was also established that large mass consumer companies
are required to detail the prices of their products and the stock they have
.
The measure was resisted by COPAL, which groups together food companies, and by Amcham, which brings together North American companies with interests in the country.
These measures come a few hours after the
March inflation
is announced next Thursday
, which would have exceeded 4%.
For this month a result is expected a few tenths lower.
The Precious Care program is present in
54 supermarket chains,
which have a total of 2,800 outlets throughout the country.
According to surveys by national and provincial offices, the program has a level of fulfillment of the supply in gondolas of the products included in the basket
higher than 80% and 99.9%
in the case of the agreed prices.
AQ
Look also
Inflation: the fight between the Government and mass consumption companies intensifies
Gondolas Law: what will wholesale and retail businesses need to change
