澳洲联邦政府经审慎考量后确认，对于年营业额超过50亿澳元的大型连锁超市，包括Coles（ASX Code： COL）、Woolworths （ASX Code：WOW）、Aldi及批发商Metcash（ASX Code： MTS），均负有公平对待其供应商的责任。
In order to ensure that the rights and interests of suppliers are not infringed, the government prohibits supermarkets from making unreasonable demands or threats to suppliers, and prohibits supermarkets from "retaliating" against suppliers' complaints. In his proposals, Dr Emerson advocated severe financial penalties of up to $5.2 billion for large chains to ensure fair and regulated competition in the market.
At the same time, he also recommended that the competition regulator should be responsible for managing the anonymous complaint process to ensure transparency and fairness of the complaint channel, and promote the establishment of new mediation and arbitration channels to resolve potential market disputes and disputes more effectively.
Looking at the stock market price, the market did not react much to this news.
To ensure that families and farmers are treated fairly, the Australian Government is working to combat anti-competitive practices in supermarkets with the aim of providing consumers with fairer and more reasonable prices at checkout. The Australian Government will take strict measures against any supermarket that violates this regulation, including imposing hefty fines.
Labor will quickly enact and introduce legislation aimed at implementing these reforms to alleviate public discontent over rising food and grocery prices and to alleviate supplier abuses.
Australian Supermarket
In the supermarket industry, the duopolys Coles and Woolworths together hold around 65% of the market share and receive a large number of complaints about market abuse, price gouging and misleading behaviour.
Recently, in a media statement released on Monday, Woolworths, a founding signatory to the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct, offered to conduct an in-depth investigation into the pricing mechanism of fresh fruit and vegetables in Australia.
The company welcomes the decision to retain a fast, cost-effective and effective dispute resolution route for the benefit of a wide range of suppliers, especially smaller ones.
At the same time, Woolworths emphasised the need for greater transparency in the costs paid to farmers. In addition, the company actively supports the federal Labor Party's initiative to enforce compliance with the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct, and pledges to fully cooperate with industry and government-led price transparency measures to help farmers make more informed decisions.
Here, we note that there has been no comment on the official website of Coles on this matter at this time.
However, a Coles spokesperson said the company adheres to a code of conduct, stressing that "strong supplier relationships are the cornerstone of our success and are important to our customers." ”
As the threshold for the regulation is $5 billion in turnover, Costco will not be immediately regulated. However, its revenue is expected to reach $4 billion in 2024, and Amazon is not regulated for the time being as it has not yet touched on products such as fresh fruit and vegetables. Dr Emerson said he expects that to change soon.
As you all know from Australia, the German retail giant Aldi has cheaper groceries than Coles and Woolwoths.
The Choice report noted that the average price of a basket of groceries within an Aldi supermarket was $51.51 after investigation.
Compared with the two major supermarkets Coles and Woolworths, its price advantage is significant, and it is about 25% cheaper than similar products.
Specifically, Woolworths has an average selling price of $68.58 for its peers, while Coles has the highest average selling price of $69.33.
In an official statement, Aldi made it clear that Choice's figures are a testament to its unwavering commitment to being "Australia's most affordable supermarket", delivering high-quality groceries at the lowest prices to meet the needs of a wide range of consumers.
As we can see from the chart above, there are currently no Aldi stores in the Northern Territory and Tasmania, and Choice compared the prices of groceries for 10 items sold in four IGA stores and found that these items were more expensive than those in Coles and Woolworths. The parent company of IGA is Metcash, which we mentioned at the beginning of the article.
How to penalize
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has the statutory power to impose fines of up to $10 million, or three times the proceeds of the breach, or 10% of the turnover in the 12 months preceding the breach, for material or systematic breaches.
For less serious non-compliances, the Commission will enforce a sub-penalty of just over $1 million, accompanied by a notice of non-compliance of up to $187,800 (these figures are similar to those presented in Dr Emerson's April interim report) to urge supermarkets to strictly comply with and meet their relevant obligations.
The 2025 general election is approaching
In the coming May 2025, Australia will have another general election. In recent years, the impact of inflation on people's cost of living has become increasingly significant and has become the focus of public attention.
In response to this challenge, the government has decided to publish regular Choice reports over the next three years, with the aim of continuously monitoring supermarket price dynamics to ensure that every household can benefit from it.
The release of the Choice report, as part of the government's key measures to regulate the nation's supermarket sector, highlighted the review of the food and grocery code of conduct by former Labour Minister Dr Emmerson, which is expected to be completed by the end of June this year.
As Tom McIlroy, a journalist for the Financial review, puts it, it's time for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to make a choice: does he support the Australian people, or does he continue to support the political donations generated by the monopoly supermarket and its billions of dollars in profits?
Is Labor genuinely trying to help the Australian people, or is it just for the votes in next year's federal election?