The president of the group Les Mousquetaires Intermarché Didier Duhaupand accused Thursday Danone of taking advantage of inflation to improve its margins with "
unreasonable
" price increases, while negotiations between agro-industrialists and distributors are still not completed.
"
There has been a change of direction at the head of Danone and their shareholders are asking them for higher profitability, this results in price increases
", estimated on BFM Business Didier Duhaupand, questioned on the absence, in a number of Intermarché stores, bottles of Evian, Badoit or Volvic, all brands of the Danone group.
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The government decided in March to reopen negotiations between manufacturers and large retailers, during which the purchase prices of a large part of the products then sold in supermarkets are decided.
The objective was to take into account the inflation of both agricultural raw materials and production, transport or packaging costs, in the purchase prices of products by large retailers.
But since March, the former have accused the latter of refusing to pay more for foodstuffs that cost more to produce or of raising prices on the shelves even though they refused to pay more for these products.
The distributors, for their part, consider certain price increases to be unjustified, or different from one manufacturer to another.
“We know the cost breakdown”
"
We are also producers, with water sources
", explained Didier Duhaupand, the Mousquetaires group having the particularity of having an agri-food branch, Agromousquetaires.
"
We know the breakdown of costs
", which "
makes us say that the requests for around 12% (price increases, editor's note) are not reasonable
" compared to the market.
He felt that Danone, “
like a number of companies, are taking advantage of the current crisis to restore their margins
”.
For his part Danone, if he told AFP "
not to be in a position to comment
" on this increase "
linked to business secrecy
", said to have "
reached agreements with most of our other customers
", agreements “
which take account of (its) economic imperatives
”.
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Jean-Philippe André, president of the National Association of Food Industries (Ania), told AFP on Thursday that for the time being "
45% of our members have not completed all of their negotiations with the all of their customers
.
He asked the government "
to encourage the players to complete these negotiations by the end of the month
", before a new phase for the 2023 tariffs begins in October, which must be completed the following March. .
"
A stack of negotiations would be really detrimental to everyone
," he said.
