OREANDA-NEWS. April 1, 2010. On 24th March 2010, Lesya Davydova, the Head of the FAS Russia's Department of International Economic Cooperation, spoke at the meeting of a group of experts of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Hanoi (Vietnam) on competition advocacy and effective antimonopoly enforcement.

The meeting was attended by representatives of competition authorities not only from the ASEAN countries but also from the leading economies.

Mrs. Davydova talked about the impact of the FAS Russia's work not only upon the state of competition but overall economic development of the Russian Federation. In particular, she discussed FAS Russia's achievements in reforming such sectors of the national economy as electric power industry, telecommunications and railway transportation, introduction of electronic auctions for state procurement and other areas of FAS Russia's activity.

Regarding competition advocacy, Mrs. Davydova pointed out that "during 20 years of their work, the antimonopoly bodies have undertaken considerable efforts to explain the principles of competition legislation to the government authorities so, in their turn, they would comply with the competition law when developing and adopting normative legal acts within the scope of their reference as well as observe these principles in their work".

Mrs. Davydova also said that "business is no longer scared to complain about unlawful actions of the authorities, which indicates increased confidence of entrepreneurs in possibilities to hold government representatives liable if they violate the antimonopoly law".

Cooperation with business and non-government institutions is also one of the most important fields of FAS Russia's activities. For these purposes:

- FAS Russia cooperates with prominent Russian lawyers and economists specializing in competition policy, within the framework of "Promoting Development of Competition", which facilitate advancement of competition in Russia

- forms Expert Councils comprising experts on various industries to better understand specific sectors and ensure equal competitive conditions for all market participants

- encourages participation of representatives of business and NGOs in various competition-centered seminars and conferences to explain them provisions of the antimonopoly law

- publishes exhaustive information about the work of FAS Russia at the official website of the Antimonopoly Service as well as supplies daily comments to the media regarding its operations

- prepares annual report on the state of competition and report on the work of FAS Russia to the Government of the Russian Federation, as well as to such influential organizations as OECD, ICN, UNCTAD and Global Competition Review

- participates in conferences, meetings and events organized by the above agencies in order to increase awareness of the international competition community about the work of FAS Russia.

Representatives of the largest competition authorities acknowledged the scope of work performed by FAS Russia on competition advocacy and wished the Antimonopoly Service successful continuation of active efforts in this field.