Dev. Min.: For the first time since the war, industries are reducing prices

“Last week, for the first time since the war, some food industries sent supermarkets price lists with reductions.” This is what the Minister of Development and Investments Adonis Georgiadis said. According to Mr. Georgiadis, “not only did they cancel the increases that they had announced, but they also made reductions” and he announced that on Wednesday he will present all the findings of the spot checks of the last two weeks.

Two support tools against increases

Referring to the government’s support measures against increases in food and products, the minister said, speaking to Sky: “We have already made two tools. The “Household Basket” on the one hand and the “market pass” on the other which starts in two weeks and will subsidize 10% of purchases. Combined the two measures for someone who is really under financial pressure far exceed inflation.”

It is not illegal to reduce the quantity

Regarding the reduced quantities of products and their prices, Mr. Georgiadis noted: “It is not illegal for someone to reduce the quantity. It would be illegal if the difference in price relative to quantity exceeded the profit ceiling. We have not put the profit ceiling in the package. We have put the profit ceiling on the weight unit and the volume. Well, we are weighing to set the fine. One cannot mock the state in this way. Because if it reduces the quantity and increases the price and exceeds the profit margin that is locked in September 2021, then there is a penalty.”

Delinquency rate under 6%

With regard to the delinquency rates during checks at supermarkets, he repeated: “In the four thousand checks we have done recently, the delinquency rate was below 6%. I understand that people feel that there is a lot of profiteering around them because they see the prices going up. But if you look at consumer prices even in food which are well above inflation, the increases are below the European average, not only of the Eurozone, which are the richest countries, but also of the European Union as a whole which is in and the very poorest. For us to be far below the European average in terms of increases, it goes to say that profiteering is not our problem. Our problem is real inflation in Europe, which has taken off – in Greece at a high speed, and I’m proud of that.”

We have collected 7 million euros in fines

When asked about the statement about “robbery” by Alexis Tsipras, Mr. Georgiadis replied: “Mr. Tsipras talked about robbery. This is very heavy talk. If he is talking about a robbery, he must tell us who the robbers are and if there are any, we should arrest them. And since I keep hearing about the controls on the market and fines for profiteering, can Mr. Tsipras tell us how many fines for profiteering haδ been imposed in his five years? Zero, not one euro. Not only did they not check, but they had no mechanism to check, there was no competent service. We have imposed the most and the largest fines. For example, we have set the largest fine in Greek history on a supermarket chain of 680,000 euros. So far we have collected a total of 7 million euros from the fines.”