OREANDA-NEWS. July 23, 2013. The 13th session of UNCTAD Intergovernmental Group of Experts (IGE) on Competition Law and Policy took place in Geneva.

Representatives of competition authorities of different countries, intergovernmental organizations, non-commercial associations as well as experts on antimonopoly law took part in the session.

On 8th July the Plenary session discussed the place of competition policy in the global agenda. In particular: the issues of the impact of competition policy upon economic trends in developing countries, poverty reduction and economic growth, as well as contribution of competition authorities in poverty reduction.

One of the speakers was Deputy Head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) Anatoly Golomolzin who pointed out that for sustainable development of the economy and poverty reduction it is essential to create institutions of competition protection (including robust actions by the antimonopoly bodies), develop competition by eliminating market entry barriers and adopting modern “rules of the game”.

Pharmaceutical market plays the key role in poverty reduction. Antimonopoly authorities expose and investigate bid-rigging cartels and agreements on delaying putting generic drugs on market, which lead to unreasonable significant increase of drug prices. Analysis shows that price regulation of socially important goods not always protects from unreasonable price growth: some regulatory bodies and medical communities promote certain medicines, which frequently is contrary to protecting the rights of patients and consumers, while foreign pharmaceutical giants operating on the markets of developing countries are not in a hurry to comply with the antimonopoly law.

Anatoly Golomolzin discussed the efforts of the International Working Group for studying prices on pharmaceutical markets, formed upon an initiative of Russia and Italy. He emphasized active work of the Group and invited UNCTAD member-countries for cooperation.

Another important aspect of poverty reduction, according to Anatoly Golomolzin, is regular monitoring of food products prices carried out by FAS together with the antimonopoly authorities of the CIS countries.

“FAS closely monitors the situation on the grain market because grain is the products at the start of both vegetable and meat product chains. In the period of low prices a grain intervention fund enables grain procurement protecting grain producers, while when prices are high it allows goods interventions protecting buyers, which, first of all, supports not only sustainable grain market but also the above-mentioned adjacent markets”, emphasized Anatoly Golomolzin.

Under modern globalization conditions, regional integration associations become extremely important. For instance, FAS pays considerable attention to its work with the antimonopoly authorities of the CIS member-states. An example is investigations on the markets of air transportation and commutations using roaming in the CIS states, which is very important taking into account geographic extent of these countries.

“For the population of our countries is interested in real results rather than declarations”, stated Mr. Golomolzin. “We were able to reduce roaming prices by 2-4 times accompanied by traffic growth. Similar efforts were undertaken on the market of air transportation. As a result, in the past three years transportation in the CIS has increased nearly twofold. So far world aviation has not achieved such results”.

At the end, Anatoly Golomolzin drew attention of the international community to the role of control over public procurement in poverty reduction: “In Russia we have moved to electronic trading, which saved over 35 billion euro of budgetary funds. Special requirements were also set for participation of small and medium business. In 2012 the sum of the contracts for small and medium businesses reached 5 billion euro, which is nearly 30 times more than is offered through direct budgetary support”.

FAS position and initiatives were supported by UNCTAD Secretariat. Anatoly Golomolzin summed up that FAS is prepared to discuss the issues of competition development in any format, including technical assistance to UNCTAD member-countries, providing training in FAS Recourse-and-Training Centre, etc.

Other speakers at the Plenary Session included representatives of France, Morocco, Pakistan, Peru, the Eurasian Economic Commission and OECD. The discussion continued at the Round Table on “Impact of Cartels on the Poor”. Participants heard a presentation by Eleanor Fox, a Professor of New York University, and representatives of the USA, Brazil, Turkey, Benin and Korea.