In cooperation with the Japan Fair Trade Commission, the Commission for Protection of Competition organized seminars for students enrolled in undergraduate, master, and doctoral academic studies in universities in Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Niš.

The keynote addresses during the first seminar are given by H.E. Junichi Maruyama, Ambassador of Japan to the Republic of Serbia, and Slobodan Vuksanović, Director of the Museum of Pedagogy, followed by expert presentations provided by Gordana Bulatović, Head of the Division for Competition Advocacy and International Affairs, Nina Vasić, Senior Advisor at the Division for Competition Advocacy and International Affairs, Takujiro Kono, Head of the Strategic Planning Division, JFTC, and Atsushi Nakahata, Head of the International Affairs Division, JFTC.

The academics were given an opportunity to learn about fundamental principles of competition policy, in addition to a number of concrete examples drawn from the practice illustrating the fight against cartels and other forms of anti-competitive behaviors.
By organizing such seminars, the Commission for Protection of Competition wishes to reaffirm the interest and commitment of students for competition policy in their scholarly works and to provide support to academics in pursuing their future professional careers in antitrust.

The seminars are held at the Museum of Pedagogy in Belgrade, and Novi Sad and Niš University Rectorates.

The Embassy of Japan in Belgrade and the Japan International Cooperation Agency provided support towards organizing the seminars.

The Foreign Investors Council presented the White Book 2019, a publication published yearly that provides an overview of the business environment, in addition to recommendations for its improvement from the investors’ perspective.

Foreign investors this year also remarked the significant progress achieved in the work of the Commission for Protection of Competition, in addition to the increased scope of the Commission’s activities in various fields of its competence, as well as its readiness to use complex mechanisms provided for by the Law.

The document commended the Commission’s efforts to more intensely use advanced economic analysis in inquiries into competition infringements and complex mergers, as well as its advance use of new econometric software to increase the quality of economic analysis in cases before the Commission.

This year’s White Book also states: “In 2018, the Commission continued making progress in competition advocacy and public relations. The Commission regularly informs the public on its activities and publishes a great majority of its decisions on its official website. However, it is noticeable that the Commission does not publish all the decisions in relevant areas or that it publishes them with significant delays, which does not contribute to either transparency or legal certainty. The Commission published on its website the Guidelines on Rights and Obligations of the Parties during Dawn Raids, as well as the Leniency Policy Leaflet. This positive development concerning competition advocacy is important as it contributes to the overall improvement of the current legal framework and to better understanding on the part of the general public and the media of competition rules and activities and the importance of the Commission’s role.”

The investors’ reiterated recommendations to the Commission are to proceed with the adoption of regulations governing particular categories of key importance for the completion of the competition regulatory framework, issue publications of the relevant definitions of product markets, and produce clear guidelines and instructions containing the manner of application of certain provisions of the Law, aimed at increasing the transparency and legal certainty.

In cooperation with the Italian partners under the Twinning project “Further Development of Protection of Competition in Serbia”, the Commission for Protection of Competition translated into Serbian the OECD Guidelines for Fighting Bid Rigging in Public Procurement.

The Guidelines offer a comprehensive overview of potential strategies employed by contracting authorities to prevent bid rigging by one or more bidders.

The Commission for Protection of Competition has established that companies Original doo Beograd, Mikops doo Niš, Birolinija doo Beograd, Biro Print Sistemi doo Beograd, Dikti Line doo, Birodeveloping doo Niš, Birotehnika doo, Jagodina, and Konica Minolta Poslovna Rešenja SE doo Beograd have coordinated their participation in public and other procurement procedures. In such manner, it is found that said companies have infringed competition law by entering into a prohibited restrictive agreement that directly or indirectly sets the selling prices or other conditions of trade, which has as its object the restriction and prevention of competition (Article 10(2/1) of the Law on Protection of Competition).

The Commission detected this collusion between competitors with the assistance from one of the participants to the prohibited agreement, providing evidence to the Commission of the concluded agreement, thus securing immunity from fines under the Leniency policy implemented by the Commission.

Given that collusions of this kind are hard to detect, the Commission uses this opportunity to reiterate the invitation to all the parties to such agreements to approach and provide evidence to the Commission and in that manner assist in detecting such agreements, and in return secure the immunity from fines for their anticompetitive behaviors, as defined in the provisions of Article 69 of the Law on Protection of Competition.