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Approximately 80 WTO Member countries have adopted competition laws, also known as “antitrust” or “anti-monopoly” laws.
“Typically, these laws provide remedies to deal with a range of anti-competitive practices, including price fixing and other cartel arrangements, abuses of a dominant position or monopolization, mergers that limit competition, and agreements between suppliers and distributors (“vertical agreements”) that foreclose markets to new competitors. The concept of competition “policy” includes competition laws in addition to other measures aimed at promoting competition in the national economy, such as sectoral regulations and privatization policies.” (from the WTO website)
At the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Singapore Ministerial meeting in 1996, four issues were identified for the WTO agenda: investment, trade facilitation, competition policy, and transparency in government procurement. These issues, widely known as the ‘ Singapore issues”, were put forward at the WTO Doha Ministerial Meeting in 2001.
It was agreed at the Doha Ministerial Meeting that negotiations on trade and competition policy would take place after the next ministerial meeting at Cancun in September 2003, after a decision was taken by consensus on what the modalities (agreements) for pursuing these negotiations would be. It was also agreed that until then WTO members would advance their discussions in the Working Group on the Interaction between Trade and Competition Policy, on the possible elements of a multilateral competition framework. However no consensus was reached at the Cancun meeting and members agreed on 1 August 2004 that competition policy be dropped from the Doha agenda.
Between the Doha and Cancun (2003) Ministerial meetings the Working Group on the Interaction between Trade and Competition Policy focused on clarifying:
There was controversy over the Singapore issues, primarily over investment, but extending to competition policy, with a strong division between the proponents of a multilateral competition framework and the opponents, largely developing countries. While countries such as the EC and Japan were in favour of proceeding to negotiate on all four Singapore issues, a number of developing countries were vehemently opposed to launching negotiations on the four issues. Developing countries without domestic competition frameworks were concerned over the potential impact of non-discrimination, transparency and cooperation commitments given their resource constraints and lack of technical capacity. Given these divisions, there was no consensus prior to the Ministerial meeting in Cancun on the shape of future negotiations on competition.
Two alternatives were therefore presented to Ministers in the Draft Cancun Ministerial Text [external link to Fifth Ministerial section of the WTO website], prepared by the Chairman of the WTO General Council but never agreed by delegations. The first option was to agree to commence negotiations on the basis of modalities agreed upon at Cancun. The second option was to return competition policy to the Working Group for further clarification of the issues, postponing the commencement of negotiations until an undetermined later date.
Given the degree of polarisation, consensus on how to proceed with any of the Singapore issues could not be reached at Cancun. The concluding statement by the Ministerial Conference Chair, Mexico’s Foreign Minister Derbez, notes that, while Members undertake to maintain the high level of convergence that has been reached in some areas, more work needs to be done in some other key areas to enable Members to proceed towards the conclusion of the negotiations and fulfilment of the Doha commitments. No formal decision was therefore taken at Cancun on the future of the Singapore issues.
After the breakdown of talks at Cancun WTO members began efforts to put the negotiations and the work programme back on track. On 31 July 2004, a framework package to guide the next phase of the Doha Round negotiations was agreed in Geneva by the WTO General Council. Competition policy, along with trade and investment, and transparency in government procurement were dropped from the Doha agenda, and the Working Group is no longer meeting.
