* Police look into surging pasta prices
* Pasta makers union says never been any speculation
(Adds comment from industry union UNIPI)
ROME, Dec 15 (Reuters) - Italian financial police have searched offices and taken documents from Italy’s five major pasta makers and an industry body as part of a probe into pricing of the foodstuff, judicial sources said on Tuesday.
Police have searched offices of the world’s biggest pasta maker Barilla and offices of such household names in Italy as De Cecco, Divella, Garofalo and Amato, as well as the Industrial Union of Italian Pasta Makers (UNIPI), the sources said.
Barilla, De Cecco, Garofalo, Divella and UNIPI all said they were fully cooperating with authorities, as they had done during an earlier investigation by Italy’s antitrust regulator. There was no immediate comment from the other pasta maker.
The police investigation, which is looking into pasta price rises of up to 50 percent from 2007 until now, started in 2007 after several consumer groups complained about price hikes.
“We reiterate that there has never been any speculation, nor has there been any agreement damaging consumers’ interest,” UNIPI Chairman Massimo Menna said in a statement on Tuesday. In February, Italy’s competition watchdog imposed 12.5 million euros ($18.18 million) of fines on 26 pasta makers and UNIPI for price-fixing that ran from October 2006 until at least the start of March 2008. Pasta makers have appealed the fines. [nLQ197585]
UNIPI said in October that “there has never been any cartel” between Italian pasta makers. [nLT393269]
($1=.6877 Euro)
(Writing by Svetlana Kovalyova; Editing by Keiron Henderson and Christian Wiessner)
((svetlana.kovalyova@thomsonreuters.com; +39 02 661 29450; Reuters Messaging: svetlana.kovalyova.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))
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