Eight EU states urged Brussels on Friday to clamp down on multinational giants unfairly limiting the sale of products within the bloc, forcing European consumers to pay more.
Their call comes a day after the European Commission slapped a 337.5 million euro (US$366 million) antitrust fine on Mondelez International Inc, the US confectioner behind major brands including Toblerone and Oreo, for restricting cross-border sales of chocolate.
The cost of living is a hot topic ahead of EU-wide elections next month as European households have been hit hard by soaring consumer prices following the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Photo: AFP
Inflation has slowed down since its peak in late 2022, but food costs remain high.
Several EU countries believe addressing unfairness in the single market is one way to help struggling consumers.
Eight EU governments led by the Netherlands said there are price differences for the same products within the EU and Brussels “should take action,” because big multinational companies were limiting the sale of goods in the EU’s single market.
The seven others named in joint paper are: Belgium, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Luxembourg and Slovakia. The issue was on Friday discussed during a meeting of EU ministers in Brussels.
EU Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager said Brussels would start with a “fact-finding mission” and then “figure out what tools are actually necessary in order to prevent territorial restrictions that make prices rise where they shouldn’t.”
The commission, the EU’s antitrust watchdog, would work with member states to find a solution, she told reporters after the meeting.
The constraints cost EU consumers more than 14 billion euros a year, the eight countries said, pointing to an estimate from a 2020 commission study.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis also urged the EU to crack down on giant firms at the weekend in a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
The free movement of goods is one of the key pillars of the EU’s single market.
“Removing trade barriers should be a key priority for the single market. This helps in keeping consumer retail prices for food and non-food products fair. Something which is especially important in times of high consumer prices,” Dutch Minister of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy Micky Adriaansens said.
The eight states propose “a concrete way forward towards an EU ban” on restricting the exchange of goods within the bloc “by amending existing or new common EU rules or instruments,” she added.
The concerns are not new. In 2019, Brussels fined the world’s largest brewer Anheuser-Busch InBev NV 200 million euros for hindering cheaper beer imports into Belgium from the Netherlands.
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