INTRODUCTION

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Member States have agreed that further efforts towards international cooperation for standardisation of competition policies, based on comity, are necessary. Five types of international cooperation were suggested by the OECD Secretariat: voluntary acceptance, based on OECD recommendations; bilateral agreement, relevant to competition; a competition chapter in bilateral or regional Free Trade Agreements (FTAs); a multi-party agreement, among more than three states and; multilateral agreements, concluded under the auspices of an international organisation, such as the World Trade Organization (WTO). In addition, the creation of a new global body responsible for the adoption of global competition standards has been suggested.

At present, the WTO agreements do not directly address competition issues. In 2001, ‘the interaction between trade and competition policy’ was selected as a topic for discussion on the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) of the WTO, but it proved impossible to overcome the differences amongst nations, and the July 2004 Package nominally excluded competition from the DDA. This setback suggests that movement on a multilateral agreement on competition is unlikely in the near future.

Given the lack of progress in the WTO, FTAs are potentially an important means of addressing competition law and policy at the international level. If competition policy is included in FTAs, the country with a more advanced legal system can help the other country develop or improve its competition law. As a result, international cooperation is strengthened with regard to economic policies and competition laws.