On September 1, 2009 the Vice-Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation Mr. Igor Shuvalov addressed words of welcome to participants and guests of the BRIC International Competition Conference in Kazan (Tatarstan).
“Dear colleagues!
Recently, in June, leaders of our countries gathered together in thousands kilometers from Kazan, in Ekaterinburg at the First Summit of BRIC countries. That time agreements on further cooperation and contacts between our countries on quite a number of questions were made. Today we are holding the forum where we will discuss the actual issues of protection and development of competition.
I will say now: we (Russia) stand for liberty of trade, for fair competition between producers of different countries and continents. We believe that only under this condition world crisis will be overcome in the most effective way and the world will get into conditions of prosperity and growth.
I would like to remind you that as a result of Summit the leaders of our countries marked in their Joint Communiqué the importance of international trade and direct foreign investments in reconstruction of the world economy after global crisis. We appeal to all countries to work together for improving investment climate, for saving stability of multilateral trade system and repression of trade protectionism. I suppose this thesis should be the starting point for the discussions at our today’s meeting.
Encouragement of competition is and will be the key direction of our economic policy, the most important factor of modernization of our economy. And we know that competition needs a defense - a defense against not only private monopolies, but from the monopolistic efforts from the state itself.
If we ask an entrepreneur from any of our countries - what is the most dangerous for the competition environment and for his business? First of all he qualifies not cartels or monopolistic prices but abuses by officials, unreasonable preferences which they give to “their” business-entities. That is why when creating Russian competition legislation we also included tools of fighting against monopolistic trends from the state itself. We suppose that this approach is important for all countries expected the fast growth in post crisis world.
It is especially important for the BRIC countries whose development depended a lot on the efforts of the state in the past. Now we synchronously reach the stage when we should restrict the influence on economy by the state represented by bodies of power and certain officials. And in many respects this is the task of the antimonopoly authorities of our countries. It would be very useful not only to share the experience but to coordinate activities in this area.
Competition environment and competition policy have at least two dimensions: competition on internal markets and global competition.
Under the internal competition policy we mean strengthening of antimonopoly regulation. Of course we should fight against abuses but we couldn’t bring all competition support policy to antitrust policy. Moreover it’s not the main task. Competition policy shouldn’t be restrictive; otherwise we couldn’t provide rapid progress in economics.
I strongly believe that the main task of competition policy is providing new companies and new products with entering the market. It improves the quality and cutting prices for consumers.
Regarding international dimension we have to recognize that development of global competition is much behind the speed of globalization of the economic processes
For developing countries food markets were closed for 30 years, and now the markets of Japan, USA, EU for many developing countries are practically inaccessible . This policy notably harms economy of the BRIC countries and impedes its economic development.
In point of fact the problem of free international trade, variety of its forms and limitation of protectionism – is the main for creation of the integrated coordinates system of global competition policy. That is the “competition dimension” of the global economy, where we should focus our attention. Because healthful competition environment is a term for establishment of the effective, healthful economic system.
In the domestic markets of our countries we tend to create equal conditions for competition between economic entities, and preventing creation of preferences or restrictions for certain enterprises. Thus global competition in the world market is increasingly limited by rising protectionism of a series of the countries – the WTO leaders.
In the frames of the Meeting in Ekaterinburg in was underlined, that in order to provide food security the smoothly running trade system is necessary in the sphere of food and agriculture, based on the principles of fairness and non-discrimination. In this regard it is essential to provide reducing of the multibillion subsidies in agricultural sector.
Our western partners tell a lot about necessity to render assistance to weekly development countries. But we fully understand that abolishment of the subsidies in agricultural sector, tariff and non-tariff barriers will favour for eradication of poverty a lot better than granting humanitarian aid to certain countries..
We stand for establishment of fair and reasonable regime for international trade of agricultural goods.
It is impossible to create healthful competition environment “inside” allowing protectionism “outside”, because protection of enterprises from external competition is not less harmful than protection from competition in domestic market.
If in domestic markets granting preferences to certain players is disapproved and prohibited than similar principles of global competition are in prospect to be formed. We can elaborate and offer these principles to world community. I would like to propose to begin working in this direction in the frames of today Conference. .
We face serious problems in field of internal competition policy. So I encourage you not only share experience in the field of countering cartels and abuse of dominant position but to discuss core issues of competition, abolishment of barriers for establishment of new business. We should comprehend global protectionism, as well as in due time every country comprehended for itself the frames of state regulation in economy and influence of certain officials on business. It is not easy task. But I warrant that policy-makers and experts attending here can promote its solving. Finally almost a half of Earth population is behind us. And development of competition is the main term for growth of its prosperity.
Thank you for your attention».
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