The Competition Council suspects a cartel agreement as a result of which some of the producers, including the largest bakery “Franzeluta”, increased the bread prices. On September 4, the Council met with representatives of the Association of Bakers and the National Association of Baking and Grinding Industries to discuss the issue, IPN reports.

According to the head of the Competition Council Viorica Carare, the decision to increase the bread prices by 15% on average is ‘illegal and against the competition rules’. “There are signs that it was a cartel agreement. Moreover, we know companies that took part in the agreement, but which are not members of the two associations. According to our information, most of the economic entities didn’t increase the prices of bread. Those who did it didn’t furnish us with arguments in this regard,” she stated.

If it’s proven that it was a cartel agreement, the economic entities that are parties to this agreement will be penalized. The fine can be 2% to 4% of the turnover for the previous year.

The Competition Council’s head didn’t give a clear answer whether the prices of bread will be decreased or not. “We will see the consequences and the individual behavior of the economic entities,” stated Carare. Each of the producers has the right to resort to active dissociation, to restore the previous situation and this will influence the Council’s decision.

The producers who took part in the meeting said there was no cartel agreement and that each enterprise has individual prices and works on different segments. “This rise was justified. Each of the companies calculates the prices depending on the production costs. There was no cartel agreement. We today saw each other for the first time,” said the representative of a private company Gheorghe Garnet.

“There wasn’t and couldn’t be an agreement. Each producer has the right to set the prices individually. Now, about 30% of the producers increased the prices of some of the products, but the price of one kilogram of wheat decreases so that we can maintain prices,” said the head of the National Association of Baking and Grinding Industries Veaceslav Gutulachi.

According to the data of the Competition Council, of the about 20 bread makers only three increased the bread prices by about 15% on August 15.