Carli Lourens
6 May 2005
Johannesburg — IN THE latest of a spate of clashes with competition authorities in SA and Europe, Sasol faces the possibility of coughing up about R6bn for alleged anticompetitive conduct in the fertiliser industry.
The Competition Commission said yesterday it had found evidence of anticompetitive behaviour by Sasol, Omnia and Kynoch in an investigation prompted by small fertiliser supplier Nutri-Flo.
The commission would recommend that Sasol, Omnia and Kynoch each be fined a maximum penalty of 10% of their revenue if the tribunal agreed that they had contravened competition laws.
The outcome represented another victory for small customers of Sasol, Nutri-Flo managing member Bruce Lyle said yesterday.
The finding comes hard on the heels of the Competition Tribunal finding in favour of Nationwide Poles, which complained about Sasol's pricing practices.
The petrochemicals group is planning to appeal against the decision.
The European Commission launched an investigation into Sasol's wax business earlier this week as part of an industry-wide probe into alleged anticompetitive behaviour and practices.
This happened after Sasol and Total abandoned attempts to merge their European wax businesses.
Sasol declined to comment on the latest Competition Commission finding yesterday, saying that it had yet to study the findings.
Omnia said it had not seen the commission's findings. Kynoch could not be reached for comment.
Nutri-Flo lodged its complaint three years ago, alleging that Sasol had abused its dominant role in the markets for fertilisers by charging customers excessive prices for certain of its fertilisers.
The small company also said that Sasol colluded with rivals Omnia and Kynoch to fix prices of certain fertilisers.
Nutri-Flo sources most of its raw materials and straight fertilisers from Sasol, and competed with Sasol, Omnia and Kynoch in the retail market.
The commission said it found evidence that indicated that Sasol, which is dominant in the markets for straight nitrogen fertilisers such ammonia, had abused its dominance by charging excessive prices for some of these products.
The commission also found that there was a co-ordinated practice or understanding between Kynoch, Omnia and Sasol whereby the price of fertilisers was fixed and maintained at certain levels.
"Collusive behaviour and price fixing are extremely bad practices", commissioner Menzi Simelane said in a statement issued by the Competition Commission yesterday.
"We will not hesitate to act on them," he said.
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