ANDREY TSYGANOV: COMBATING CROSS-BORDER CARTELS IS ONE OF THE UNCTAD PRIORITIES FOR THE NEXT FIVE YEARS
Round table on combating cross-border cartels was held within the framework of the 8th UN Conference on Competition
The initiative to hold a round table on this topic was proposed by the FAS Russia and supported by the UNCTAD Secretariat and UN Member-States during the 18th session of the UNCTAD Intergovernmental Group of Experts (IGE) on Competition Law and Policy, held in July 2019 in Geneva (Switzerland).
Andrey Tsyganov, Deputy Head of the FAS Russia, was the moderator of the Round table on combating cross-border cartels. During his speech, he noted that cartels are a serious violation of the competition law. However, due to their secretive nature they are difficult to detect and suppress.
The discussion was opened by Lesya Davydova, Head of the Department for International Economic Cooperation of the FAS Russia.
"In modern conditions of globalization and digitalization, cartels often lose their local character and become international. In this regard, there is an increasing need of international cooperation, aimed at effective and efficient interaction", said Lesya Davydova.
The key presentation was made by Alexey Ivanov, Director of the BRICS Competition Law and Policy Centre, who presented the results of an empirical study of the issues of cross-border cartels. The report is based on the analysis of the results of a survey of competition authorities in 37 countries. The participants filled out the questionnaires proposed by the research group, highlighting the key issues of combating cross-border cartels and challenges that international antimonopoly community faces in this area. Thus, for example, only 12 out of 37 surveyed competition authorities have practical experience of interaction in investigating cross-border cartels, while almost everyone is aware of the importance of this instrument of international cooperation.
In his speech, Alexey Ivanov presented possible solutions to the issues that foreign competition authorities are currently facing when investigating cross-border cartels.
As a follow-up to the discussion, representatives of the world's competition authorities shared their practices. Alexandre Cordeiro, General Superintendent of the Administrative Council for Economic Defense of Brazil, spoke about the main obstacles to effective international cooperation in cases of cross-border cartels. Su-hyun Yoon, Commissioner for the Fair Trade Commission of South Korea, shared his experience in combating cross-border cartels, problems and ways to solve them. Hardin Ratshisusu, Deputy Commissioner of the Competition Commission of South Africa, expressed his opinion on what effective means of cooperation are needed to investigate cross-border cartels, and Richard Powers, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Criminal Enforcement of the US Department of Justice, spoke about the recent work of the International Competition Network (ICN) to combat cartels.
In addition to panelists, the discussion was also attended by Ashok Kumar Gupta - Chairman of the Competition Commission of India, Sakon Varanyuvatana - Head of Competition Authority of Thailand, Yanis Lianos - Head of Competition Authority of Greece, Ivan Vezhnovets - First Deputy Minister of Antimonopoly Regulation and Trade of the Republic of Belarus, Cai Junfeng - State Administration for Market Regulation of the People's Republic of China and Fatma Adel - Legal Consultant to the Chairman in Competition Law and Policy at the Egyptian Competition Authority.
"We all agree that investigating cross-border cartels is a truly global issue that is now in the focus of international organizations. We thank the UNCTAD Secretariat for the opportunity to discuss this important topic during the 8th UN Review Conference of the Set on Competition. UNCTAD's efforts can make a great contribution to what has already been done on this and other platforms", stressed out Andrey Tsyganov.
Summing up the discussion, Andrey Tsyganov noted that combating cartels is an important matter not only of developed countries, but also of developing ones, where competition authorities have just appeared or where they are relatively small.
"27 participants in the survey of the BRICS Center noted the need to find new approaches to improve their competence in detecting and investigating cross-border cartels and 30 competition authorities said that cartels pose one of the most dangerous threats to national economies. 23 competition authorities, mostly from developing countries, noted that having uniform international guidelines containing tools and methods for combating cross-border cartels will help them in developing law enforcement practices against cross-border cartels. In this regard, the fact of including the issue of combating cross-border cartels as a priority topic for UNCTAD for the next five years has acquired particular relevance in the Resolution of the Conference. The proposal of the FAS Russia was supported by 26 countries and thanks to our joint efforts, it was included in the text of the Resolution of the Conference", said Deputy Head of the FAS Russia.
In order to continue the work in the field of combating cross-border cartels Andrey Tsyganov proposed to create corresponding Working Group at the UNCTAD platform, which will highlight best practices, as well as facilitate information exchange and consultations.
"UNCTAD is a suitable platform for developing updated mechanisms for combating cross-border cartels that meet the interests of most countries in the world, regardless of their level of economic and socio-cultural development. We invite everyone to join this work and designate the issue of combating cross-border cartels as a priority topic for UNCTAD's work for the next five years, which will be secured in the Resolution of the Conference", concluded Andrey Tsyganov.