Cooperation issues discussed in China
On 11 April 2017, FAS delegation led by Deputy Head of FAS Andrey Tsyganov was received by Vang Zhangping, Vice-Minister of State Administration of the People’s Republic of China for Industry and Commerce (Beijing, China)
Vang Zhangping described the most high-profile SAIC cases, particularly, investigations on the markets of food, products, insurance, telecommunications, car manufacturing and the agro-industrial complex. He pointed out that SAIC is oriented towards socially important markets where violators can be transnational corporations as well as state-run or private companies. Recently, the competition law in China has undergone considerable changes designed to enhance efficiency of competition policy.
Andrey Tsyganovpresented the results of FAS work in 2016, informed about FAS being assigned tariff regulation powers, and talked on devising the National Competition Plan in Russia. He informed the Chinese colleagues about BRICS events which FAS is organizing in 2017 (the year of China chairmanship in BRICS) and invited SAIC representatives to chair or co-chair those events. The parties discussed FAS initiative on establishing BRICS Competition Centre, which will focus on analytical and research support of the efforts of the competition authorities in BRICS economies. Special attention was paid to developing cross-border cooperation and interaction between the regional bodies of FAS and SAIC in the Far East area.
Andrey Tsyganovpointed out that FAS pays special attention to unfair practices of large transnational corporations. It is a common issue for all countries in the world, therefore, FAS has put forward an initiative to develop the International Toolkit on international cooperation between competition authorities to counter restrictive business practices of large transnational corporations. The Toolkit can be built up in the system of international competition acts and adopted at the UN platform. Mr. Zhangping agreed with the need to counter anticompetitive practices oflarge transnational corporations and assured FAS delegation in the readiness to support the initiative.
Finally, the parties emphasized that FAS and SAIC have been developing productive cooperation for over 20 years based on the relevant Intergovernmental Agreement; the bodies have experience of successful information and experience exchange, and in the future the cooperation will be even more robust.
