An Inspection team comprising officers from Competition Commission of Pakistan carried out search/inspection of the premises of Pakistan Poultry Association offices located in Lahore and Islamabad today. The inspection was carried out in the wake of suspicion of anti-competitive behavior on part of Pakistan Poultry Association. The Commission received certain information indicating that the association may have prima facie acted in contravention of Section 4 of the Competition Act by favoring business entities for the export of poultry products and by acting on behalf of the poultry industry in commercial operations. In addition recent news paper reports, informal complaints received over emails and examination of price lists by CCP officials raised a strong suspicion regarding exorbitant and parallel increase in the prices of poultry feed by feed mills in the domestic market. Officials at the premises of Pakistan Poultry association fully cooperated with the inspecting team by offering complete access to all documents and materials during the search/inspection procedure. A thorough search/scrutiny of the impounded documents would now be carried out by the assigned officers of the Commission and the findings would be revealed in due course of time. It is relevant to mention that the Commission imposed a penalty of Rs50 million on PPA in 2010 for cartelization in various poultry markets. The decision of the Commission was challenged by PPA and that case is a pending adjudication in the High Court, the current search and inspection was carried out on the basis of fresh information received by the Commission about recent activities of the Association.
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