"Prices are determined by the market, and when there are monopolies, they are determined by the regulators. The Commission for the Protection of Competition is to prevent cartel entities that have great market power and are not a natural monopoly from having cartel or monopoly prices. We have submitted several signals in the Commission and they were never considered in substance", said the chairman of AIKB Vasil Velev in the studio of "Denyat ON AIR".

According to him, the remarks against the CPC are well-founded, and at the moment the retail chains have significant market power.

"Whether or not there is a cartel is difficult to determine, that's why there are regulators. It is important for us to have greater transparency," commented Velev to Bulgaria ON AIR.

According to him, there are no serious proposals for a price ceiling.

"A price ceiling does not work well, it leads to a shortage, to a black market, to the disappearance of goods from the shelf. If such a price ceiling is introduced for a certain item that the lowest income strata use, the corresponding costs that will not be able to to cover this ceiling of the chains, may be transferred to other items. Thus, people with higher incomes will absorb this difference," explained the chairman of the AIKB.

Branch organizations with a comment on the ceiling of the mark-up for food products

If we compare inflation for January, we are not the country with the highest inflation, according to Velev.

"It is true that it is significantly above inflation in the Eurozone, which we aim for, but it is lower than all the countries to the east and northeast around the Sofia-Berlin axis. In Hungary it is 28%, 15% in Slovakia, we are at 14 %. This inflation is not small, the reason for it is significantly higher than the European average. The Bulgarian reasons are excessive spending, which was poured out by populism at the expense of increasing the country's indebtedness. The second reason is the late compensations for the extremely high electricity prices." , the guest pointed out.

In the studio, Velev announced that a working group had been created, and a decision is expected next week.

"In order for prices to go down sustainably, we must have sustainable public finances. It is important that the budget for the year, which will be considered by the next National Assembly, be according to the guidelines of the EC," the guest also said.

Vasil Velev

food prices