CUTS-ISID Panel Discussion on World Competition Day 2024

The Background

World Competition Day held annually on 5th December, to commemorate the day on which the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Set of Multilaterally Agreed Equitable Principles and Rules for the Control of Restrictive Business Practices (the UN Set) – so far the only multilaterally agreed international instrument on competition policy. The theme of this year’s World Competition Day is, ‘Competition Policy and Inequality’.

With economic inequality on the rise globally, the role of competition policy is being explored. Historically, competition law emphasised market efficiency over equity. However, contemporary perspectives argue that unchecked market consolidation, in the guise of ‘efficiency’ may facilitate wealth concentration, limiting access to market benefits for lower-income and underrepresented groups.

The session aims to explore how competition policy can help address inequality by deliberating its implementation in critical sectors like manufacturing, agriculture, small businesses, consumers, employment and so on.

The session will engage with relevant questions such as:

(i) How growing economic concentration and market power need to be dealt with? How entry barriers to small businesses can be removed?
(ii) How socio-economic factors can be part of competition analysis?
(iii) How bottlenecks in the global food supply chains could be tackled to benefit small farmers and consumers?

The panel discussions are expected address some of these questions and aim to outline practical competition policy reforms for a fairer and more inclusive economy.