Uprava za Zaštitu Konkurencije

Legislation in the area of competition represents the Law on Protection of Competition (Official Gazette of the Republic of Montenegro, No 69/05), which started to apply as of January 2006 and Law on Amendments to Law on Protection of Competition (Official Gazette of RMN, No 37/07), which the was adopted by Parliament on 6th May 2007, and this created the legal framework for the establishment and work of the operative indipendent entity for competiton protection  - the Directorate on Protection of Competition.

Based on Decree on Amendments of the Decree on modes and organization of governmental administration (Official Gazette of RMN No. 06/07) enforced as of 24.11.2007, Administration on Protection of Competition was established, which taken over the activities of competition protection, prescribed by Law on Amendments to Law on Protection of Competition (Official Gazette of RMN, No 37/07).

Directorate on Protection of Competition is registered in the Department of Statistics of Montenegro on 14.02.2008.

The Directorate has taken over the activities regarding competition protection from the Office for competiton protection within the Internal trade and competition department of the Ministry for Economic Development. This ensured the European principles of regulations in competition, which is the solution in complience with EU in the phase of negoatiations on stabilization and association.

Competences of the Administration for competition protection are:

1) to follow the competition on the market in general and the markets of individual sectors of economy;

2) to grant exemptions from prohibition of individual agreements and authorize concentration of undertakings under the prescribed conditions, and solve other issues within its competency pursuant to this Law;

3) to take decisions in the procedure for determining impairment of competition prescribed by this law;

4)  to undertake measures toward undertakings and associations of undertakings for distortion of competition or to prevent such distortions, terminate already existing and eliminate harmful effects for undertakings and consumers;

5) to analyze the conditions on the market from the aspect of the free and effective competition and reports to the Ministry the identified market conditions;

6) to prepare the specialized grounds for the drafting of the secondary legislation, the implementation of the European and other international standards and instruments from the area of the protection of competition;

7) to establish the international cooperation with the competent authorities of the other countries and international organizations;

          8) to publish the statistical data from the area of the protection of competition;

9) to perform other activities pursuant to this Law.

Government of Montenegro on the session held on 29.10.2009, has established the Rulebook on internal organization and systematization of Directorate for competition protection, and officials’ and employees’ placing for 16 executers were systemized, out of which 9 are currently employed. By the Rulebook on internal organization and systematization of the Administration for competition protection, within established responsibilities of the Administration three internal units were formed:

-       Department for following concentrations, forbidden agreements, abuse of dominant position and international cooperation

-       Referee for infringement procedure prosecution

-       Department for general operations.

On the 19.06.2009. Government of Montenegro has adopted the Strategy of the competition policy. Aim of this policy is to ascertain conditions for consumer safety on the market and possibility wider choice,  as well as better quality and variety of products. Strategy precisely describes the way of operation of responsible competition authority, whose main task is by efficiently enforcement of legal resolutions on prohibited agreements and abuse of dominance position, as well as control of concentrations, to ensure competition in favor of consumers, general welfare and competitiveness of economy.

During 2006. and 2007. the following bylaws were adopted:

-       Decree on detailed conditions for exemptions of agreements as per types and determination of types of agreements wich can be exempted for prohibition (Official Gazette of RMN No. 10/07)

-       Regulation on content of the application and mode of registry of notified agreements (Official Gazette of RMN No. 36/06)

-       Regulation on content of the request for individual exemption (Official Gazette of RMN No. 36/06)

-       Regulation on form and content of application for the registry of approved concentrations and the application form and mode of running the registry(Official Gazette of RMN No. 36/06)

-       Regulation on the form and content of the request for initiation of proceedings (Official Gazette of RMN No. 36/06)

-       Instruction on criteria in defining the relevant market (Official Gazette of RMN No. 77/05)

-       Instructions on the form and content of the request for issuance of approval for proposed concentration (Official Gazette of RMN No. 77/05)