“We are in favor of many possibilities and increasing competition to de-escalate prices. It is the government’s choice to strengthen the participation of producers in the public markets and the access of citizens directly to producers”.

This was recently stated by the Minister of Development, Takis Theodorikakos, and in this context, a dialogue is underway to increase the participation of producers in the public markets, while the possibility of holding public markets in the afternoon hours is also being considered, in order to make it easier for consumers to do their shopping as well as the producers as they have their agricultural work in the morning.

As the Secretary General of Trade and Consumer Protection Sotiris Anagnostopoulos has pointed out, speaking to journalists, the dialogue is in the final stage.

Mr. Anagnostopoulos has pointed out that the goal of the Ministry of Development is to have greater competition but also an unmediated relationship between the farmer-producer and the consumer.

At the moment in the public markets, he added, there is a mixture of producers and traders. What will change is that producers will be given the possibility of easier access to sell their products in the public markets, while new public markets are also being considered. As he underlined, however, this will be done by a decision of the local government. In other words, the TA body responsible for the public markets of the region will make the decision on where and when the public markets will operate for the producers, but also on whether there will be afternoon public markets for the convenience of consumers as well as themselves of the producers as, in addition to the financial aspect for the operation of the public markets, there is also the nuisance aspect.

According to the course of the dialogue, the public markets without intermediaries will be “set up” mainly in the urban centers of the region and each producer will have the possibility, within the boundaries of his prefecture, to have his stall and sell his products.

For the relevant bill that is currently being processed, the producers, for their part, underline that in order to have even cheaper prices than those currently offered by a public market, what needs to be done is to help the producer in the costs he pays, while they note that there are enough street markets, it is not so important to create new ones as to make it easier for more producers to participate in the existing ones – which are 1000 across the country and 300 in basin of Attica – while in that market in their afternoon operation many procedural problems should be solved such as for example that there should be lighting.