To address trade doubts and despite the poor results, the Secretary of Commerce, led by Matías Tombolini, confirmed today that he is moving forward with his project to extend the Fair Prices programme, with a basket of 40 to 50 products for Chinese supermarkets, shops and neighborhood businesses. official sources They denied “complications in the negotiations” with producers and wholesalersensure that they already have “17 confirmed products” e that they may even release it “this week”.
This new version contradicts the obstacles to the creation of a specific program for the proximity channel, claimed by small merchants, to reduce the price gap with large supermarket chains. as posted clarion yesterday, official and private sources acknowledged that the matter had been discussed for two weeks, but “That there’s still nothing concrete.” This has also been talked about “the negotiations were complicated”, but they do not rule out “working on it later”.
Faced with this, Tombolini’s office denied the delays. They specified that they have already confirmed almost half of the basket with some producers and that “others are about to close” soon, for prepare a final basket with about 50 basic items at regulated pricesintended to supply shops, warehouses and small regional chains. “The idea is to announce it this month, as soon as possible”official sources say.
The goal is to arrive with Fair Prices, which covers a universe of 25,000 products, with a maximum increase of 5% per month for the next 90 days, divided into two phases: 3.2% in the first week and another 1 .8% after launching on the 20th. The program essentially focuses on large supermarket chains (Carrefour, Jumbo, Coto, Día and Changomás), which they account for 40% of basic consumer sales. The government now wants to partially cover the rest of the channels, albeit with a smaller basket.
This is the third time an attempt has been made to extend the regulated price program (like the current Fair Price) outside the large supermarket chains. Paula Español and Roberto Feletti, two of Tombolini’s predecessors, had already tried without success. The initiative is an exact replica of “Super Close”, launched in 2020, and “+ Precios Cuidados”of 2021, which has never been able to settle for an optional due to lack of goods.
Manufacturers, wholesalers and suppliers insist that replicating the same recipe in supermarkets and independent warehouses is no easy task. “The Super Search basket contained 60 consumer products, but the big problem was the supply. In AMBA we discovered that only 17 had stocks,” recalled Fernando Savore, president of the Buenos Aires province’s federation of shopkeepers. The greatest difficulty is covering an extremely fragmented channel of activity, many of which are located in remote locations of the large urban centers of the country.
This weekend, in the midst of announcing the package of measures to contain inflation, the Government slipped a small pearl alluding to the proximity basketball project. Referring to the opening of tariff-free food imports, the official statement stressed that in the face of the alleged “rejection of wholesalers and large companies”Chinese supermarkets and local shops could be supplied with a basket of products defined by the Ministry of Commerce, imported from the Central Market “to break with the price abuse practiced by these companies in supplying these proximity points of sale”.
The “proximity channel basket” initiative expresses the enormous official concern about the inflationary escalation of recent months. In April, the cost of living rose by 8.4%, thanks to the increase in seasonal products (12.8%) and in the food and beverage category, which stood at 10.8%. To avoid new overflows, the Government has announced the creation of the “Commercial Operations Monitoring, Traceability Unit”, a table that will centralize all information on price jumps along the entire value chain. They advanced that the goal is to react quickly “to the detection of price distortions” in the different links of the production chain.
Source: Clarin
