Insee Première · October 2024 · n° 2018

A rise in the agrifood industry's margin rate from 2019 to 2022 concentrated in the groups

The margin rate for active enterprises in the agrifood industry increased by 2.7 points from 2019 to 2022, reaching 31.2% in 2022. Despite the health crisis, the margin rate remained stable in 2020. It then increased in 2021, a year marked by the post-health crisis economic recovery, a reduction in production taxes, and with an increase in subsidies. In 2022, as in 2020, margins remained stable once again, in a context of rising raw material costs.

These aggregated results cover significant sectoral disparities: the margin rate was nearly half as low in the manufacture of food products (26.5% in 2022) as in the manufacture of beverages (49.3%). Within the food manufacturing sector, the margin rate ranged from 19.4% in 2022 for the manufacture of bakery products to 43.9% for the manufacture of vegetable and animal oils and fats. The trends between 2019 and 2022 were also mixed: an increase of 3.8 points for beverage manufacturing, and 2.2 points for the food manufacturing.

The margin rate for enterprises organized in groups increased between 2019 and 2022 (+3.6 points), while that of independent enterprises decreased (-1.3 points). Enterprises organized in groups have usually a stronger market power than independent enterprises, allowing them to achieve a higher margin rate (in 2022, 33.3% compared to 21.3%). The gap between independent enterprises and groups widened significantly over the period (12.0 points in 2022, compared to 7.1 points in 2019).