Spanish retailers criticised for massive margins

There is a huge disparity between the price paid by Spanish retailers for a wide range of agricultural products and the price at which they are eventually sold on to the consumer, according to a new survey by the Spanish farmers' organisation, COAG.

Food producers have been coming under increasing pressure from the supermarket sector for many years, and not just in Spain, but the COAG research shows to just what extent the retail sector is apparently marking up its products.

A report in the Cinco Dias​ newspaper, COAG and its members fear that the situation is getting out of hand, so much so that it could destroy the already precarious economic balance in the food sector and force some companies out of business.

The paper cites the survey of prices at four supermarket and hypermarket operators in Spain - Carrefour, Mercadona, Eroski and Caprabo - which were then compared with the prices paid by the chains to the food producers.

The mark up on fresh fruit and vegetables such as mandarines, oranges, lemons, grapefruits, aubergines, marrows and lettuce was found to be substantial, varying from 111 per cent for clementines to a massive 667 per cent for marrows. The average mark up was 227 per cent.

For meat products, the mark ups were less dramatic but nonetheless significant, ranging from 122 per cent for pork to 191 per cent for veal, and with an average of 154 per cent.

COAG and its members are calling for all segments of the Spanish food industry to reach an agreement similar to that brokered recently in France, where supermarkets and producers have agreed to a number of measures, such as improved transparency and the setting of a minimum price for certain products during crop shortages.

But this agreement was reached only after food producers blockaded stores run by the major supermarket groups, and it could take similar action in Spain before all the parties are prepared to sit round the table - action that COAG and its members seem prepared to take.