FAS: IT IS IMPORTANT TO ADAPT ANTIMONOPOLY REGULATION TO MODERN CONDITIONS

It was announced by Andrey Tsyganov, Deputy Head of FAS Russia, at the IX Eurasian Antimonopoly Forum in Almaty

Deputy Head noted that the work of FAS Russia is aimed at implementing the National Competition Development Plan.* One of the key areas of this work is development of fair competition in the commodity markets.

In this regard, Andrey Tsyganov spoke about the authority’s measures to control socially significant markets, including warnings to economic entities and admonitions to officials of such entities as well as prevention of monopolization and manipulation of markets.

Besides, Deputy Head of FAS Russia raised the issue of antimonopoly regulation measures in digital markets and shared the experience of the Russian competition authority.

The topic of digitalization was continued by Anton Teslenko, Head of the Fiscal Control Department of FAS Russia. He spoke about new types of evidence used in antimonopoly investigations, including social networks, online maps, websites and exchange data.

Oksana Kuznetsova, Head of the Department for Cooperation with Regional Offices and Coordination of Projects for the Development of Competition of FAS Russia, spoke about the tools for preventing violations of antimonopoly legislation. The most effective of them is the antimonopoly compliance - a risk management system aimed at preventing violations. The speaker also highlighted the key elements that the antimonopoly compliance should contain, particularly, risk assessment procedures and mitigation measures.

In addition, issues of development and protection of competition in the agricultural sector markets were discussed. Larisa Vovkivskaya, Head of the Department for Control over Agro-industrial Complex of FAS Russia, spoke about the work of the antimonopoly authority for control of food commodity markets. The authority constantly analyzes the current price situation in order to identify unjustified price increases. The specific features of the industry affecting both the development of competition and the setting of prices were also noted.

At the end of the event, the participants concluded that such meetings allow building a dialogue between the antimonopoly regulators of the Eurasian countries and representatives of the expert community and business to discuss issues on improving competition legislation.

For reference:

* Directive of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 2424-r of September 2, 2021 approved the National Competition Development Plan for the period 2021-2025

The Eurasian Antimonopoly Forum has been held in Kazakhstan since 2014. Every year heads of antimonopoly authorities of the member states of the Union, representatives of the Competition Directorate of the European Commission, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the UNCTAD, the OECD, the International Competition Network, judges of the EAEU Court and Kazakh courts, leading experts and corporate lawyers participate in the forum.