Once a year, Global Competition Review (GCR), the leading publication of competition policy and law, evaluates competition institutions on a five-star scale, and forms the top of the world's most effective competition institutions. Last year, in addition to the star rating, an additional rating was introduced, based on the evaluation of independent legal service providers in each country. In this international evaluation, the Competition Council of Latvia (the CC) ranked fifth among all the world's most highly rated competition institutions.
Independent legal service providers evaluated the competition authorities in ten categories on a five-point scale:
- Legal powers to address anticompetitive harm;
- Financial and personnel resources to address anticompetitive harm;
- Influence and advocacy tools to address anticompetitive harm;
- Analytical sophistication in merger reviews;
- Analytical sophistication in conduct investigations;
- Length and timing of its investigations;
- Institutional independence;
- Transparency and adherence to due process;
- Ambition;
- Success before the courts.
In the overall ranking, the CC ranked fifth among all the world's most highly rated competition institutions, receiving 3.93 points out of 5. On the other hand, in separate categories, the institution was ranked 2nd and 3rd among all the world's best competition institutions.
So, for example, in the category - the best rated institutions according to their success in court – the CC ranked second among the world's best competition institutions (4.33 points out of 5). Also, according to the evaluation of legal service providers, the CC was ranked second among the best competition institutions, evaluating institutions according to their transparency and adherence to due process (4 points out of 5). At the same time, the second position was obtained by evaluating the CC according to the time devoted to investigations (4.33 out of 5 points), and in the third place - by evaluating the institution's ability to use the financial and personnel resources to address anticompetitive harm (4.33 out of 5 points).
Currently, there are a total of more than 140 countries with competition supervisory authorities in the world, but only 33 of them have entered the GCR individual assessment ranking. In the assessment, the CC ranked among countries such as Germany, Australia, the United States, etc.
More information on the Global Competition Review (GCR) assessment: https://globalcompetitionreview.com/survey/rating-enforcement/2021/article/market-perception-survey-data.