Other countries join Slovak initiative against retail chains

It can't be ruled out that Slovakia won't "inherit" the working agenda dealing with the abuse of retail chains' economic power towards farmers and producers during its 2016 EU Presidency, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Ľubomír Jahnátek said during the session of Council of the European Union's Agriculture and Fisheries Council in Luxembourg on Tuesday. According to him, a number of his counterparts outside V4 and its three partner countries [Bulgaria, Romania and Slovenia] have taken interest in the abuse of retail chains' economic power, as the Slovak proposal garnered support in the discussion also from Portugal, France and Lithuania. "They've lent support to our initiative in the discussion and identified problems similar to those faced by Slovakia. The issue of retail chains and abuse of economic power seems to have become a serious problem in the European economic space", said Jahnátek. When asked by TASR whether the topic might end up at a working table of the Slovak EU Presidency in the second half of 2016, Jahnátek replied that it can't be ruled out. "I'd be quite glad if the issue of retail chains came to the table during the Slovak Presidency, seeing as we were the country that has initiated this within the whole EU and it'd be good if we could find a solution", said Jahnátek. He added that Slovakia has ample experience and a sufficient number of qualified people who could draft a European-wide solution to the issue.