Europe 1 with AFP 4:52 p.m., March 7, 2024

Ham and charcuterie manufacturers were again sentenced on Thursday on appeal for price agreements, but their sanction was significantly reduced compared to that imposed by the Competition Authority four years ago.

The Paris Court of Appeal confirmed Thursday that these manufacturers had indeed been guilty of anti-competitive practices and imposed fines amounting to some 39 million euros in total, according to the ruling consulted by AFP.

This sanction is more than twice less than that of 93 million euros in total imposed on July 16, 2020 by the Competition Authority on this “cartel”, for acts committed between 2010 and 2013.

In its decision, the court of appeal "exonerated" several companies concerning one of the three alleged cartel practices and considered that the participation of other companies was "diminished in its duration".

“The amount of financial sanctions imposed is reduced accordingly,” explains the court in a press release.

The Breton cooperative Cooperl, French leader in pork production and which had been the most heavily sanctioned by the Competition Authority (35.5 million euros), was fined 13 million euros on appeal.

Cooperl “takes note” of this decision and “the exceptional reduction in the fine imposed on it,” the company said.

But the cooperative, which says it is the victim of "false accusations", will "appeal to the Court of Cassation to obtain recognition of its perfect innocence", it announced in a press release.

“Particular financial difficulties”

The court of appeal notably took into account "the particular financial difficulties justified by the Cooperl group" in order to reduce the sanction.

The magistrates rejected a similar request from the Fleury Michon group, sentenced by the court of appeal to a fine of 12.9 million euros, compared to nearly 14.8 million euros in fines in 2020.

Contacted by AFP, the company did not react immediately.

Second industrialist most heavily condemned by the competition police (31.7 million euros fine), the Les Mousquetaires group (Intermarché, Netto) sees its sanction considerably reduced on appeal, to 5.6 million euros .

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The court notably ruled that it was not possible to attribute any of the alleged offenses to the group's subsidiaries.

The Musketeers did not wish to comment.

The Swiss group Coop, the French industrialist Savencia (Bordeau Chesnel, Saint Agaûne brands) and the Swiss food industry giant Nestlé, parent company of the Herta company, are also among the sanctioned companies.

Their convictions were also reduced on appeal.

Secret meetings in hotels

Overall, the three cartel practices sanctioned by the Competition Authority "are judged to be established by the Court of Appeal", indicates the latter in its press release.

The four main charcutiers-curers had worked together, by exchanging by telephone or emails, to "present a common front" during negotiations with pig slaughterers on variations in the weekly purchase price of wet-free ham, a raw material listed on the Rungis market, "in order to counter requests for price increases, or even to obtain price reductions", notes the court.

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If these practices are "particularly serious", they do not constitute "the most serious of them" and their impact on the economy has remained "very limited", the magistrates qualify.

The two other prohibited practices consisted of manufacturers agreeing on the price increases that they intended to apply to mass distribution brands for their raw and cooked charcuterie products, under distributor brand or under "first price", and on the responses to be made to calls for tenders.

The Competition Authority's investigation uncovered more than 300 bilateral exchanges and six secret meetings between competitors, in hotels in Paris and Lyon.

These practices were notably revealed thanks to the so-called leniency procedure, which, according to the competition watchdog, "allows companies having participated in a cartel to reveal its existence to the Authority and to obtain, under certain conditions, the benefit of a total or partial exemption from financial sanctions".