OREANDA-NEWS. October 27, 2009. Today competition is a national priority for Russia and a constitutional standard, said Igor Artemyev, the Head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia), presenting the report "On the State of Completion in the Russian Federation" at the 107th session of the Competition Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

Presenting the report is the first step towards Russia joining this influential organization as a full member. For the first time Russia's intention to join OECD was stated in June 1995 at the summit of the leaders of G7 and Russia in Halifax (Canada). In May 1996 Russia officially applied for accession to OECD. In December 2007 the Council of OECD named Russia's accession "the goal shared by the Organization".

According to the Head of FAS Russia, the review of the state of competition in Russia, made by OECD experts in 2004, allowed to identify those areas that should be focused on in order to ensure development of healthy completion. "The result of this work is considerable modernization of our competition policy and enforcement", said Igor Artemyev.

The Head of FAS Russia described the main activities of the Russian competitions authority and talked about modernization of the antimonopoly legislation which has been taking place in Russia in the recent years.

According to Igor Artemyev, currently cartels pose the most threat to development of competition. The Government of the Russian Federation has declared that struggle against cartels is one of the national priorities.

"We endeavor to reduce administrative barriers for business and investments, which is fully in line with the OECD recommendations. Also we effectively control the most significant, in terms of their influence upon competition, transactions or violations of the antimonopoly legislation", emphasized the Head of FAS Russia.

Igor Artemyev stated that FAS Russia is directly involved in the work on reforming natural monopolies. These reformed are aimed at enabling transition from the obsolete system of government regulation of pricing and financialу policy in this field to the market mechanisms that facilitate competition and balance of interests of producers and consumers.

Igor Artemyev specially discussed another major FAS Russia's responsibility - control over the authorities. "This work is a priority. It enables pro-competitive development of the economy and prevents potential attempts of the authorities to introduce various barriers to free movement of goods or create some preferential conditions for individual enterprises", pointed out the Head of FAS Russia.

Finally, Igor Artemyev expressed his confidence that the status of a full OECD member would enable closer cooperation of FAS Russia in applying and disseminating OECD best practices of competition law enforcement.

Igor Artemyev answered the questions from members of the Committee with regard to cartels, control of economic concentration, control over foreign investments to strategic industries of Russian economy, and information exchange between completion authorities of different countries. Members of the Committee were interested in FAS Russia's control over natural monopolies, practice of preventing abuse of dominance, as well as priorities of the FAS Russia's activities.

Reference:
On 21st October 2009, the Competition Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development discusses whether Russia is ready and able to assume the obligations of full membership in OECD.

The decision about inviting the Russian Federation to become an OECD member will be made on the basis of the following documents:

1) The Initial Memorandum presented by the Russian Federation;

2) A general review of the economic policy of the Russian Federation, as well as its policies on other several key issues, that are not fully or completely regulated under the OECD regulatory and legal framework;

3) Analytical reports about the position on the Russian Federation with regard to the documents, that are not subject to consideration by any OECD body.

This is the first step towards Russia joining OECD as a full member.