Britain's supermarket price war intensifies with Co-op cuts
LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's Co-operative Group [42TE.L] has added fuel to the country's supermarket price war with another wave of cuts.
The company, which is the UK's fifth-largest supermarket chain by sales, said on Wednesday that the price reductions on more than 200 of its own-brand British-sourced meat and poultry products would total 75 million pounds ($105 million).
The Co-op's move follows salvos already fired this year by Wal-Mart's Asda, Morrisons and discounter Aldi [ALDIEI.UL].
A supermarket price war is regularly cited in official data as a factor bearing down on UK inflation.
Asda and Morrisons, the third and fourth-largest groups among the so-called Big Four, have joined market leader Tesco and No.2 player Sainsbury's in cutting prices to try to narrow the gap with Aldi and fellow German discounter Lidl [LIDUK.UL], who have been winning market share.
Industry data published last month showed that Co-op was the fastest growing non-discounter for the first time since 2011.
($1 = 0.7115 pounds)
(Reporting by James Davey; Editing by David Goodman)
