Citat:
Big merchants formed `trusts', which decided the purchase price, who will buy what, and so on. This angered the smaller traders and farmers, who lobbied for competition laws, and succeeded."
Mehta writes that in India cartels have been alleged in various sectors, including cement, steel, tyre, trucking, and family planning devices. "India is also believed to be a victim of overseas cartels in soda ash, bulk vitamins and petrol. All these tend to raise the price or reduce the choice for consumers."
A box story in the book is about the bulk vitamins cartel that was rampant during the final decade of the last century. "US anti-trust authorities exposed a global conspiracy by leading chemical manufacturers in the bulk vitamins market to fix prices, allocate markets, supply contracts and sales volume and engage in bid-rigging. The cartel controlled the most popular vitamins, including vitamins A, C and beta-carotene (a form of Vitamin A)."
The conspiracy led to artificial increases in prices for hundreds of food, beverage and medicine makers, the bulk users of vitamins as additives. Sordidly, investigations revealed that `the colluding companies acted as if they were working for a single corporation, dubbed Vitamin Inc and reaped huge profits from the high prices.'
Despite the international exposure of the cartel, no action has been taken in India, rues CUTS (Consumer Unity & Trust Society, based in Jaipur).
`Vitamin cartel' continues to be alive in current news. `EU court cuts UCB, raises BASF, upholds Akzo Nobel vitamin cartel,' reads a Forbes headline dated December 12. "The
EU's second-highest court has cut, increased and upheld fines imposed by the European Commission on UCB SA, BASF AG and Akzo Nobel NV respectively for participation in a choline (?) chloride cartel, otherwise known as vitamin B4 used in animal feed," opens the Brussels-datelined report.
"In 2004, the commission said its investigation found the companies had colluded in secret to set prices and share markets for the vitamin from 1994 to 1997. In 1997, the companies controlled around 80 per cent of the global market for choline chloride. The market was worth around 180 million euros."
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