“The tools are there to identify unfair practices”

In the hunt for undeclared income from influencers the Authorities are now, with the general secretary of Trade and Consumer Protection, Sotiris Anagnostopoulosto emphasize that “the tools now exist to be able to ascertain these kinds of practices, precisely because they are repeated”.

Speaking on the ERTNews program “PRIME” he noted that “even a friendly relationship that someone can have with a business when it often becomes black advertising – as long as it is not mentioned to consumers that it is an advertisement, an advertising effort – obviously it is problematic from the point of view of consumer law”.

At the same time, he continued: “There is now the possibility to detect this. We do not rely on checks, which are done simply by eye, but on the use of electronic tools, which allow us to identify the repeatability of these cases and thus justify the professional relationship.”

“To the extent that Greece participated, we had 20 cases, this is a sample. It does not mean that it obviously included all the influencers who are active”, Sotiris Anagnostopoulos also said and continued:

“But it’s very critical to say that it’s very important that influencers understand that what they’re doing is a commercial activity, they have to be taxed, they have to protect and follow consumer protection laws.”

Invited to comment on it appeal to the Supreme Court of the Association of Children’s Food and Special Nutrition Businesses of Greece to cancel it profit ceiling in the baby milkstated:

“Look, every business and every storyteller can go to court against the decisions and laws of the state. In any case, however, the state feels safe in the sense that these measures are primarily of an emergency nature and to the extent that this map is emergency and justified by the circumstances, they are obviously constitutionally tolerated.”

“Of course, we cannot prejudge the court’s decisions, but this is the state’s position,” continued the general secretary of Trade and Consumer Protection.

“Deceleration of both core and food inflation”

For inflation, underlined: “Inflation and accuracy in general is a key problem facing Greek society and inflation is something that is unfortunately not a Greek phenomenon. It is global, which we all face together.

The reason why we had slightly higher inflation in recent months compared to the rest of the European Union was precisely because we are comparing against last year where inflation is lower across Europe.

So in the end what happened and the government’s measures succeeded was to delay inflation, so that it reaches Greek households as slowly as possible.

It seems that now – and this is the picture that exists not only in Greece, but in all of Europe – that we have a steady de-escalation of both core inflation and food inflation.

Precisely because the interest rate policy of the European Central Bank has begun to bear fruit.

However, the measures that the government has taken and especially the measures that are permanent and structural in nature, seem to have an effect on specific commodity markets. This is now also reflected in the statistics of the Hellenic Statistical Service and we hope that this trend will continue in the coming months (…)

We are always on the alert and that is why measures are constantly being taken, especially when there is high consumer demand. For example now, during Easter, there are two categories of products.

Major product categories in which increased demand is observed are food, Easter table and Holy Week tables. Similarly, another issue is the toys, the lamps that concern our little friends and consumers. So there is a very high demand there.

There is a risk that inflation will create problems for consumers and that is why measures are being taken.

However, the measures that have been taken in the last period of time are structural in nature, with the aim of slowly reducing prices, and if possible inflation in categories of goods in which market distortions are present”.