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The monopoly over the sale of infant milks falls, they will be sold in supermarkets at lower prices

07 December 2011 / 16:12:43  GRReporter
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Prices of infant milks for babies up to 6 months in Greece will drop by 20% from 1 January 2012. The drop, which will greatly relieve thousands of families, will be possible due to the elimination of the 23-year-lomg monopoly over the sale of this type of milk only in pharmacies.

Following the decision of the Minister of Health and the Minister of Regional Development, the sale will be liberalized and parents will be able to buy the milk from supermarkets. The Ministry and the producing companies and retail chains have reached an agreement, which made the decrease in prices possible.

Milks for babies up to 6-12 months and over 1 year have been sold in supermarkets for years. As for infant milk, there was a monopoly, based on a regulation for price control by the commercial inspection and on the refusal by the medicines and pharmacists agency in Greece to remove it. About a month ago, the Commission on competition delivered an opinion for the need to remove the restrictions.
 
Infant milks for babies up to 6 months are sold in Greece at much higher prices than in other European countries. They cost the consumers much more than toddler milks.

For example, the cost of infant milk powder for babies up to 6 months in a pack of 900 g in Greek pharmacies is € 25. Its price in Spain is € 16.95 and toddler milks of the same company in supermarkets cost € 17.60 on average. Similar is the situation with the products of another renowned company whose infant milk costs € 11.30 at pharmacies and whose milk for babies over six months is sold in supermarkets at an average price of € 7.05.

The ministerial decision has provoked a sharp response from the Panhellenic Union of Pharmacists. They refer to a European Court ruling, stating that the sale of such milk should take place only in pharmacies because the product storage, exposure, and provision of competent information for parents by pharmacists cannot be conducted in supermarkets by staff untrained for that purpose. Pharmacists add that Greek Medicines Agency supports their opinion.

Interestingly enough, the monopoly abolition was announced two days after the Deputy Minister of Regional Development Sokratis Ksinidis had commented on the subject in Parliament. He said, "What modernizer or reformer refuses the sale of infant milk in supermarkets and allows its sale only in pharmacies at much higher prices than those in Germany."

In their angry message, pharmacists attribute the statements to an inner- party offensive against the Minister of Regional Development Michalis Chrysochoidis, who has announced his candidacy for PASOK’s leadership and challenged many of his colleagues with his statements. "It is only certain in this case that the government will give supermarket chains another "gift," which it will take from pharmacists," they state.

 

Tags: EconomyCompaniesInfant milkSalePharmaciesMonopolySupermarketsDecrease of prices
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