Brussels, 29 November 2011: Business-to-business contractual practices, competitiveness in the agro-food industry and the monitoring of food prices will be the main interest of the 2012 work of the High Level Forum for a Better Functioning Food Supply Chain. One year after its launch meeting the Forum adopted today its mid-term report.

The Forum welcomed in particular the Principles of Good Practice agreed by eleven organisations of the sector. These principles represent a significant step forward taken by the food supply chain in the fight against unfair practices in business-to-business relationships. Effective implementation and enforcement tools now need to be designed to bring actual improvements on the market. In the spirit of better regulation, the Commission invited the food supply chain representatives to put forward credible implementation options to the Forum by June 2012.
The Forum also highlighted other positive developments, such as the work on corporate responsibility and sustainability agenda in the context of competitiveness.

In a joint statement, European Commission Vice-President Antonio Tajani, Commissioner for Industry and Entrepreneurship, and fellow commissioners Michel Barnier, John Dalli and Dacian Cioloş said: "We are making good and solid progress. We must now speed up our pace and delivery to fulfil our objectives. The work of this Forum becomes all the more relevant in the current economic context: we need an efficient and competitive food chain, to the benefit of our producers, manufacturers, retailers and consumers."