MILAN/PARIS (Reuters) -UniCredit CEO Andrea Orcel plans to meet Credit Agricole management to discuss their partnerships after the Italian bank offered to buy smaller rival Banco BPM, a person familiar with the situation told Reuters.

Credit Agricole is crucial to the success of Orcel's bid because it owns 9% of BPM and because UniCredit has an agreement to sell funds distributed by asset manager Amundi - which Credit Agricole owns - to its clients in Italy.

Orcel is planning to meet with the French bank in the coming days, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. It was not immediately clear who Orcel will meet, but Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera reported it would be CEO Philippe Brassac.

UniCredit and Credit Agricole declined to comment.

UniCredit this month unveiled a surprise 10 billion euro ($10.6 billion) unsolicited takeover offer for BPM, which the target bank has since rejected.

The move upset some in the Italian government, which had advanced plans to merge BPM with Monte dei Paschi di Siena as a way to strengthen the country's banking sector without harming competition.

Credit Agricole irked UniCredit two-and-a-half years ago when it became BPM's biggest investor, not long after an earlier aborted takeover attempt by the Italian bank of its rival.

($1 = 0.9461 euros)

(Reporting by Valentina Za and Mathieu Rosemain; Writing by Tommy Reggiori Wilkes; Editing by Karin Strohecker and Alexander Smith)