THE deputy president of the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA), Eddie Downey, has called for the abolition of the National Consumer Agency following its statement that the Irish grocery market would benefit from the arrival of yet another multinational retailer.
According to Mr Downey: “Experience shows this will only result in a further squeeze on hard-pressed suppliers, while retailers maintain their own margins at the expense of both producers and consumers.
“Competition has clearly failed in the grocery sector. At the root of the problem is the imbalance of power in the food supply chain between the supermarket multiples, which can dictate prices, and ultimately producers, who are being forced to accept uneconomic terms at prices below the cost of production.
“This market failure can only be tackled by transparency in the share-out of the consumer price and effective regulation of retailers. We need a statutory code of practice enforced by a retail ombudsman with the power to fully investigate retailers’ treatment of their suppliers and impose substantial fines for breaches of the code. The government facilitator John Travers must come forward with a strong code of practice aimed at rebalancing power in the food chain so that producers and suppliers are treated as equals with retailers.”
Mr Downey branded the NCA as “an example of a government quango that does not serve a useful purpose” and claimed that it had been “naive and ineffectual in dealing with the retail multiples and is afraid to bite the bullet on retail regulation and publication of their profit margins”.
He concluded that producers, suppliers and consumers would be much better served by a robust code of practice backed up by a retail ombudsman with statutory powers.