French officers raid importers of banned Algerian rival to Nutella
Customs agents in Marseilles were jubilant when they pried open a shipping container to find nine tonnes of contraband substance.
The illicit goods were not, however, drugs or cigarettes, but 15,300 jars of sticky hazelnut spread.
The port seizure in May was part of a campaign by the authorities to bar El Mordjene, a sweet Algerian spread that enjoyed explosive success last year thanks to a craze propelled by TikTok and Instagram.
Across French cities, officers are raiding shops in areas with populations from the country's big 'Maghreb', or north African community, in a vain attempt to stamp out a black market in El Modjene.
Despite seizures, such as a 200kg kilogram shipment confiscated in Argenteuil, a Paris suburb, in April, the supply continues, with jars selling under the counter and online for an average of €15, with some reaching €25. That is up to six times the price paid for the product in Algeria.
The authorities banned the spread in September because it contains 12 per cent dried milk and Algeria has no agreement with the EU to import dairy products.
Fans of the sweet spread, including many in Algeria, believe France has acted out of malice towards its former colony at a time of raised tensions and to protect Nutella, the Italian chocolate hazelnut spread. Ferrero, which produces the spread, has its biggest factory and market in France.
'The EU took action once the spread posed a threat to Nutella's market share, leading to rigorous testing and the establishment of stringent standards,' Mustapha Zebdi, the head of the Algerian Consumer Association, said.
Lotfi Khammar, an official with the Federation of Algerian Exporters, said: 'Competition with Nutella was the real cause of the ban on the Algerian product entering France.'
The El Modjene row has triggered claims of sinister motives from both sides of France's cultural divide.
On social media, posts by Algerian-French people see another attempt by mainstream France to 'keep down' its Muslim immigrants. Some claim that the spread was banned because its logo features a woman wearing a veil.
Right-wing commentators see the craze for El Modjene, which has a creamy flavour many liken to Ferrero's Kinder Bueno bars, as another symbol of a takeover of traditional white France by Muslims from the Maghreb.
The Ferrero group has denied that it was involved, saying it 'refutes the reports about its supposed implication in the prohibition in France of any product'.
Cebon, the company which has made El Modjene at its factory near the Algerian port city of Oran since 2021, is unhappy and bemused by the way it has been eliminated from the French market after freely importing the spread for three years.
It points out that the illicit dairy product is French powdered milk. 'This is the limit because we have been exporting this product since 2021 and the powdered milk we use is bought in France and just processed in Algeria,' Amine Ouzlifi, the company's commercial director told le Parisien newspaper.
The company has also promised legal action against imitators who exploited the raging demand for El Modjene by marketing taste-alike copies in France, some of them made in Turkey.
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