Return of price regulation proposed in Parliament in Kazakhstan

Tengrinews.kz - Kazakhstan proposes to return to price regulation in some sectors. First of all, this concerns the energy coal market and services technologically related to natural monopolies. This was announced today in the Mazhilis by the First Deputy Chairman of the Agency for the Protection and Development of Competition, Rustam Akhmetov.
Speaking in Parliament, Akhmetov recalled the Presidential Decree on the liberalization of the economy, within the framework of which an order was adopted to maximally deregulate all commodity markets, with the exception of monopoly ones.

"But there are segments where the monopoly structure is unchanged, and there we propose to introduce price regulation," the deputy chairman of the agency noted.

In particular, this concerns the energy coal market, since 80% of the country's power plants depend on this resource.

"We regulate electricity prices along the entire chain, but coal remains on the sidelines. We believe that this area requires control," said Rustam Akhmetov.

In addition, the agency proposes to return price regulation to some services related to natural monopolies. According to the deputy chairman of the agency, recently, some services have been removed from the main regulated sphere, which has led to an increase in prices.

"We are talking about connection, pressure testing, a number of repair works. We believe that such services should again be subject to control," the official explained.

The agency is also initiating changes to antitrust legislation.
For example, it is proposed to cancel the requirement that a monopolistically high price should be the highest on the market.

"In the municipal coal market, for example, there are dominant companies whose sales volume is much higher than that of small participants. Their selling price is lower, but this does not mean that there are no signs of a monopolistically high price. We are canceling this restriction in order to strengthen control," Rustam Akhmetov added.

According to the deputy chairman of the agency, strengthening regulation will prevent unjustified price increases and protect consumers.
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