His amendment was submitted to Parliament today and will be voted on tomorrow Ministry of Development for the reduction of prices in supermarkets as well as two other measures, in order to deal with the accuracy in the market.

The initiative for “Permanent Price Reduction” will be in effect until May 31, 2024 and the companies that produce or wholesale consumer products that will participate will have to declare it to the Ministry of Development by November 30, 2023.

In more detail, the amendment submitted to the draft law for the “Incorporation of Directive (EU) 2019/2121 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 November 2019 amending Directive (EU) 2017/1132 with regard to cross-border conversions, mergers and splits of capital companies)” provides for three arrangements. The obligation to announce product price increases from supermarkets, the labeling of products with a price reduction commitment within the framework of the “Permanent Price Reduction” Initiative as well as the publication of fruit and vegetable prices.

Specifically, the amendment provides that supermarkets with a turnover of more than 90 million euros are obliged to notify the Ministry of Development of any price increase by a supplier of consumer products that are necessary for a decent living or those that show high demand and the aim of the measure is to monitor of the evolution of the wholesale prices of the products for the timely planning of public policies to deal with them market imperfections.

In the event of non-compliance by businesses, the fine will be 50,000 euros for each concealment of information.

Also, supermarkets should inform about the indicative retail prices of fruit and vegetable products and the Ministry of Development will announce the indicative prices to consumers, through the websites of the Ministry of Development and the General Secretariat of Trade, as well as “e-katanalotis”. For violators, the fine will be 20,000 euros, unless the failure to announce prices is due to reasons of force majeure or objective reasons of technical impossibility.

In addition, the labeling of products with a price reduction commitment is institutionalized. In this case, businesses, industries and wholesalers of consumer products will be able to participate in the “Permanent Price Reduction” initiative if, by November 30, 2023, they send a written commitment to the Ministry of Development for a price reduction of at least 5% – excluding promotions actions – for the next six months. The companies’ commitment to the “Permanent Price Reduction” includes: the unique code (“barcode”), the brand, the type and content of the product, per unit of measurement, the contracting company and the commitment to reduce the selling price.

The products that will participate in the initiative will be labeled with a clear special mark on the shelf while the supermarket companies will be obliged to fully transfer the reduced selling prices of their suppliers to the final consumer. In case of non-compliance with the written commitment, the fine will amount to 50,000 euros per product code.

The use of the special mark by supermarkets on products that do not participate in the initiative “will be punished with a fine of 2,000 euros per store and per product code.