Competition Authority called upon to drive prosperity for all

Staff Writer | Friday April 12, 2019 13:46

Prof Totolo was guest speaker at the Competition Authority’s symposium held at Avani hotel earlier today. The BIUST leader emphasized the importance of  a well functioning market as this is where business happens, jobs are created and incomes and overall social welfare is improved. 

The academic  described the ideal business  environment as one that  embodies attributes of perfect competition such as  many buyers and sellers, free entry and exit, symmetric information and producing similar goods.

The BIUST leader further said  the perfect market for  businesses should enable businesses to produce a wide variety of quality goods and services as efficiently as possible and  at the lowest cost. Such markets should also be attractive for buyers or consumers, enabling them to buy a wide variety of goods or services at the lowest possible price, Prof Totolo enthused.  

Efficient and allocation of  resources, such as land, labour and capital were also mentioned as ideal for a well functioning market that maximises social welfare.    However Prof Totolo described the real life business competition as far from the utopian , but ever  fiercely competitive and cut throat, often seeing few players dominating the i market or colluding in price fixing in some instances.

The BIUST Vice Chancellor noted that it is due to this nature of competition that a regulatory body like the Competition Authority exists to bring order and ensure that competition is undertaken ethically  and according to the rules and regulations laid down.