Heads of BRICS competition authorities held talks in Portugal
The main issue was preparing to the forthcoming Competition Conference in Brazil
Heads of BRICS competition authorities had a meeting on 10 May 2017 at the Annual Conference of the International Competition Network (ICN) in Porto (Portugal): Devender Kumar Sikri, Chairman of India Competition Commission; Tembinokosi Bonakele, Commissioner, the Competition Commission of South Africa; Gilvandro Vasconselos Coelho de Araujo, President of Brazil competition authority (CADE). FAS delegation was led by Deputy Head of FAS Andrey Tsyganov.
The main issue was preparing to BRICS Competition Conference in Brasilia (Brazil) on 8 - 10 November 2017. The parties discussed organizational aspects and put forward the agenda proposals. FAS proposals concerned mechanisms and methods of international cooperation, performance efficiency of competition authorities as well as competition on the new markets.
The parties agreed to continue discussing preparation to the BRICS Conference at a special meeting during St Petersburg Legal Forum on 17 May 2017 with Heads of the competition authorities from all five BRICS member-states.
Andrey Tsyganov also invited representatives of all competition authorities from BRICS to take an active part in a session on the tools and procedures of international cooperation at the 16th UNCTAD session of the Intergovernmental Expert Group (IEG) on competition law and policy (5-7 July 2017, Geneva, Switzerland). The initiative to include the session in IEG UNCTAD agenda was proposed by FAS in 2016 and supported by more than 20 UN member-states.
Head of FAS Department for International Economic Cooperation, Lesya Davydova summed up the meeting results: “Cooperation within BRICS is an example of efficient interaction between competition authorities, which is built up on the principles of mutual trust, respect and interest in achieving results for the benefit of economic development and improving the life of the population of our countries”.