Competition law of the European union (EU) prohibits all agreements between undertakings, decisions by associations of undertakings and concerted practices which may affect trade between Member States and which have as their object or effect the prevention, restriction or distortion of competition within the internal market (Art. 101 (1) TFEU). Agreements and concerted practices covered by this prohibition are void, and their participants are subject to sanctions.
It is common in liner maritime transport that shippers offer services of liner maritime cargo transport together (so-called consortium). That kind of cooperation between shippers can surely lead to a restriction of competition in the common market within the meaning of Art. 101 (1) TFEU, and consequently to the application of sanctions which EU law prescribes in those cases. That is especially the case with hard-core restrictions such as setting service arrangement rates or allocation of market or customers. However, consortia can also have some positive effects. They can help to improve productivity and quality of liner shipping services or promote technical and economic progress.
Having in mind those benefits and specific characteristics of shipping consortia, they have been subject to block exemption since 1995. Generally speaking, block exemptions refer to certain categories of restrictive agreements and exempt those agreements from the prohibition, under the condition that they satisfy the conditions prescribed with the regulation on block exemptions.
In 2009 the first regulation on block exemptions was replaced with the new Regulation (EC) 906/2009.
By virtue of the new Regulation, the rules that apply to consortia are simplified and radically changed. In July 2014 it was concluded that block exemptions are still justified and that conditions based on which the scope and content of Regulation (EC) 906/2009 are set have not changed significantly. Therefore, it was decided that Regulation should apply until 2020.
The goal of this presentation is to review the boundaries of permissible conduct in the context of liner maritime transport and warn about practices that could be incompatible with EU competition law. This is of outmost importance since the Republic of Croatia, as a Member State of the EU, has become obliged to directly apply Art. 101 and 102 TFEU.
