The Anti-Corruption Agency, Commission for Protection of Competition and Republic Commission for Protection of Rights in Public Procurement Procedures have signed the Agreement on cooperation. The Agreement is signed by Tatjana Babić, the Agency Director, Miloje Obradović, PhD, the Commission President, and Hana Hukić, the Republic Commission President.


The Agreement is signed on the sidelines of a workshop on public procurements in the light of issues regarding the fight against corruption and protection of competition, held from 8-9, November in Aranđelovac, organized by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

This represents the expression of readiness for cooperation aimed at the protection of public interest, reduction of corruption-related risks and strengthening of institutional integrities.
The workshop analyzed issues related to the protection of rights in public procurement procedures, determination of conflict of interests with reference to the conflict of interests in public procurements, public procurements and competition policy, and setting of a joint cooperation areas in the context of the Public Procurement Law, Law on the Anti-Corruption Agency and Law on Protection of Competition. (Photo:OSCE/Milan Obradović)

Improvement of cooperation between competition authorities of Montenegro, Serbia, Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina was the key topic discussed by the said institution representatives at the TAIEX Regional Workshop held in Podgorica, in addition to the participation of a large number of experts who shared their experiences with event participants.

The workshop attendees on behalf of the Commission for Protection of Competition were Ms. Gordana Bulatović, Chief of Staff of the President of the CPC, Ms. Ivana Macanković, Advisor at the Department for Investigation of Concentration, and Ms. Olivera Bergam, Adviser at the Department for Competition Infringement.

The TAIEX Regional Workshop was organized as a part of European Commission project for strengthening Western Balkan countries’ institutional capacities. The co-organizer of the Workshop was the Agency for Protection of Competition of Montenegro.

The event was opened by the Director of the Agency for Protection of Competition of Montenegro, Mr. Miodrag Vujović, who noted that connection and interdependence of our markets clearly point to the necessity of a harmonized approach to competition policy, foremost for the investors’ sense of protection from acts that might jeopardize equality of all undertakings.

Experts presenting the EU member countries experiences in similar situations, contributed to the overall success of this Workshop, and foremost: Austrian experiences on German-speaking markets (Natalie Harsdorf Enderndorf, Austrian Federal Competition Authority), Lithuanian experiences in Baltic countries (Daumantas Grikinis, Competition Council of the Republic of Lithuania), Slovak experiences in the Slovak-Czech region (Michaela Nosa, Antimonopoly Office of the Slovak Republic), and Slovenian experiences in the Western Balkan region (Marko Stoilvoski, Slovenian Competition Protection Agency). Petra Krenz from EC Directorate-General for Competition spoke on advantages gained from functioning of the European Network for Competition. She suggested regional competition authorities to consider forming a regional center for competition, whose goal would be more efficient operating of each institution individually, but also creating interactions between expert services from Western Balkan regional competition authorities, which would improve the quality and efficiency in securing equal conditions in all markets covered by those bodies.

The President of the Commission for Protection of Competition, Miloje Obradović, PhD, met with the delegation of the Embassy of Japan, headed by the First Secretary at the Embassy, Mr. Kanno Yoshifumi.

President Obradović introduced collocutors with current issues related to competition policy, and Commission’s activities within the EU accession process.

Also, the topic of conversation was placed on the analysis of the state of competition and competition-related protection measures in Japan and Serbia, possibilities of bilateral cooperation and joint activities through operating in international organizations dealing with the competition law and policy, as well as the support of further projects of Japan in which the Commission for Protection of Competition takes active involvement.

The President of the Commission expressed gratitude to the Japanese officials for support and assistance to Commission’s operating provided so far, implemented via projects for strengthening capacities of the Commission for Protection of Competition.

The Secretary General of the Commission for Protection of Competition, Dragan Penezić, PhD, and Ms. Nina Vasić, Adviser at the Department for International and Domestic Cooperation of the Commission for Protection of Competition, also attended the meeting.

Siniša Milošević, PhD, Chief Economist of the Commission for Protection of Competition, held a lecture for students of the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade. During the lecture, Dr Milošević introduced students with the Commission for Protection of Competition’s mandate, as well as the legal framework based on which the competition protection policy in Serbia is conducted.

During the lecture, Dr Milošević presented students with several international cases of detecting competition infringement and introduced them with the basis of competition protection policy.

President of the Commission for Protection of Competition, Miloje Obradović, PhD, and Head of the Department for Economic Analysis, Siniša Milošević, PhD, attended the American Chamber of Commerce formal celebration of 15 years of operations in Serbia.

The event gathered representatives of member companies, state institutions, corps diplomatique, the media and other significant partners who have by attending supported the continuous work of the AmCham in promoting competition, transparency and free entrepreneurship as doing business key values.

The Commission for Protection of Competition supports operations of all business associations in Serbia and encourages their education-related efforts and operations that contribute creating equal business conditions on the market of our country.

President of the Commission for Protection of Competition, Miloje Obradović, PhD, met with newly appointed Head of Economic Affairs Section of the USA Embassy to Serbia, Ms. Carolina Hidea, and her team.

President Obradović introduced collocutors to current issues from the filed of competition policy and Commission’s activities related to EU accession process.

The topic of conversation also included options for further strengthening of expert and educational support via competition policy related projects, organization of seminars, visiting lecturers, conferences, joint study programs on competition policy, etc.

Present at the meeting were Dragan Penezić, PhD, Secretary General of the Commission for Protetion of Competition, and Ms. Nina Vasić, Adviser at the Department for International and National Cooperation of the Commission for Protection of Competition.

Beginning October, a presentation titled Market Analysis of Aftersales Service (Aftermarkets) was held at the Commission for Protection of Competition’s premises. Representatives from the Commission for Protection of Competition, Public Policy Secretariat of the RS, PERFORM Project, in addition to research team members of the Institute for Economic Sciences participated in the meeting. The information on this activity was published on the PERFORM Project website as well.

The Commission for Protection of Competition is one of the PREFORM project beneficiaries. The PERFORM project, implemented by Helvetas Swiss Intercooparation SRB representative office, in cooperation with the Public Policy Secretariat of the Republic of Serbia, is implementing four pilot-projects aimed at straightening of evidence-based policy making.

Apart from that, the basic goal of the review on competition related implications on aftermarkets, including guarantees, customer service, turnover and the use of spare parts for motor vehicles and top selling home appliances, was to determine the structure and relations between main market actors, their market shares and relative power, aimed at detecting possible market deficiencies, i.e. presence of competition infringements conditions. The analysis developed a series of conclusions and recommendations that will be published on the website, following the concluding adoption procedure by the Commission’s Council.

During the meeting, all project partners praised the high quality of established collaboration during all project implementation phases and expressed their satisfaction with project related participation. The Commission’s representatives expressed their pleasure with achieved study’s results that provided answers to basic investigation tasks as defined by the project’s ToR.

The report on performed analysis will be published on the Commission’s webpage, taking into consideration undertakings request for protection of specific data. Apart from the call addressed to undertakings to submit their comments to the Commission, the Report will be forwarded to state institutions, identified as responsible for certain issues in the study (Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications, and Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure).

On the basis of analysis results, a regulation on the group exemption of vertical agreements in the motor vehicle sector will be drafted, thus transporting the EU Commission Regulation 461/2010 into our legislature. Apart from the said, additional investigation will be placed on observed cases that could limit, prevent or disturb the competition on specific markets. Following investigation of certain cases, it will be decided on the existence of a sufficient basis for initiation of competition infringement processes, or merely on drawing the attention of undertakings to certain rules in the context of competition policy.

PERFORM Program Officer Svetlana Kijevcanin announced a conference that will be held in early December where the operational model of all pilot projects will be presented together with the results of all four research studies.

PERFORM website link for related news published in English:

http://www.perform.network/en/news-and-events/43_research-results-on-market-analyses-of-aftersales-services/

This year as well, the International Competition Network organized its 13th annual workshop dedicated to the enhancement of knowledge on cartel detection, the ICN Cartel Workshop, held in Madrid, Spain.

The host of this year’s four-day workshop, dedicated to the additional training of competition infringements experts, is Spanish competition authority – Comision nacional de los mercados y la competencia.

Experts from the Department for Competition Infringement, Mr. Vladimir Antonijević and Ms. Marija Kovačević, represented the Serbian Commission for Protection of Competition at this event.

During the workshop, the discussion is focused on strategies for cartel detection and investigation, introduction to available tools for deterrence, as well as on cooperation between different competition authorities in the domain of cartel detection and prevention.

As in previous years, lecturers are the EU Commission’s cartel detection experts, in addition to experts coming from countries with multiannual experience and practice in detecting numerous types of competition infringements.

In addition to competition authorities, the workshop is intended for participation of NGO experts.

The Commission for Protection of Competition’s delegation consisted of the Commission for Protection of Competition’s Council member, Marko Obradović, and Senior adviser in the Department for investigation of concentration, Gordana Lukić, following invitation sent by the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation, attended “The Russian Competition Week” held in Moscow.

The motto of this manifestation, as well as the plenary session’s topic was “New reality. New challenges. New competition policy”.

On the sidelines of this three-day conference, the Commission’s delegation also had a bilateral meeting with the Vice-President of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation, Anatoly Golomolzin, on the improvement of relations and cooperation between the Serbian and Russian competition authorities.

The Commission for Protection of Competition of the Republic of Serbia and the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation have signed an Agreement on cooperation in 2012, which was followed by a series of joint activities that have considerably influenced the improvement of the Commission’s operations.

Based on the Agreement, the FAS training center in Kazan held seminars and training events participated by many employees from the Commission’s administrative and professional services, alongside the organization of the last year’s study visit and a visit of Russian colleagues to Serbia.