Best practices in defence of competition in Argentina and Brazil: useful aspects for Central America

Developing countries with a relatively long expertise in competition policy, such as Argentina and Brazil, may provide a very valuable point of reference for developing countries that have acquired more recently a competition legal and institutional framework. Among the recommendations that can be derived from Argentina and Brazil for other more recent comers to the competition institutional arena are: i) the importance of having a single and independent body in charge of applying the competition law; ii) the need for competition policy and the judiciary system to coordinate their actions; iii) the complementarity of competition and regulatory institutions for the exchange of information and the definition of common objectives; iv) the promotion of an effective competition culture within the community is also an important task of the competition agency; v) the regional agreements for mutual support in competition problems has been very important for Argentina and Brazil and seem even more relevant for smaller economies.