1. A perspective of the food supply chain
EP workshop on "relations along the food supply chain", 19 June 2012
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Philippe CHAUVE
Head of the Food Task Force
DG Competition
19 June 2012
The views expressed in this presentation are personal and do not commit the European Commission

2. A few issues and ideas thereabout
Prices
Value-added in the chain
Who is behaving badly?
The farmers’ position
Unfair trading practices
Main sources: ECN report and Task Force’s own investigation

3. Agricultural commodity Price developments

4. Consumer Price developments

5. Consumer Price developments

6. What drives prices (source « ECN food report », monitoring and antitrust actions by Competition Authorities)
Demand or supply characteristics and variations: e.g. Irish groceries, Italian fruit and vegetables, beer in UK and Latvia. => prices are not necessarily the result of anti-competitive behaviour
Weakened competition: e.g. Bulgarian, Danish, Latvian and Lithuanian dairy processors
Competition law infringements, about 50 cartels in : e.g. cartels of millers, bakers or pasta producers in the cereals chain, cartels of poultry producers and of egg producers .

7. Distribution of value added in the EU-25 food supply chain (1995-2005)
31%
29%
24%
33%
11%
13%
27%
28%
30%
1995
2000
2005
Food retail
Food
wholesale
industry
Agriculture
100%=
476 bio €
522 bio €
537 bio €

8. Consumption of processed and non-processed food

9. Consumption of processed and non-processed food

10. Price transmission : the Dutch NCA analysis on 2005-2008
Levels with the highest number of cases in the food sector: processing and retail

11. The enforcement record 2004-2011
Levels with the highest number of antitrust cases in the food sector: processing and retail

12. What about the farmers’ position?
Unequal bargaining power is a fact identified by NCAs in many markets in the first level, sometimes further downstream: e.g. for milk producers /dairies in Bulgaria, France, Hungary and Romania, bakeries / retailers in Latvia
Pro-competitive consolidation on the primary production level is the way forward
=>A key element of the CAP reform

13. What about « unfair trading practices »?
Many NCAs investigated them
Few cases under national competition law, essentially about retailers in three member states
most instances do not harm consumer welfare=> not a competition issue
some NCAs question the impact on innovation and choice
=> Follow-up: self-regulation under the HLF, a Commission communication, investigations by competition authorities

14. Thank you!