Kenya’s Competition Authority reviews buyer power standards

Back in 2017, the Competition Authority of Kenya issued the Buyer Power Guidelines to clarify on the provisions on the abuse of power in the Competition Act 2016. It has been five years since then. The authority went back to the drawing board to review the guidelines after a number of considerations. 

Part of the factors arising to this necessity include the demand to equip stakeholders with a better understanding of the standards, process and tools used by the authority to analyse if an enterprise has buyer power and that it has abused this power. The Consumer Authority has included new provisions in the reviewed guidelines which cater to this clarification. 

Other provisions added include a specification of the criteria used to identify that an industry requires a standard code of practice to regulate abuse of buyer power. The Authority will also publish a code of practice for various sectors geared towards the same goal of preventing instances of abuse of buyer power.