In the Official Gazette of the Republic of North Macedonia no. 60 of March 20, 2024, the Law on Unfair Trade Practices in Practices in the Supply Chain of Agricultural and Food Products was published. This law complies with Directive (EU) 2019/633 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 April 2019 on unfair trading practices in business-to-business relations in the agricultural and food supply chain.
The purpose of the Law is to regulate the rules and measures to prevent the imposition of unfair trade practices that deviate from good trade behavior, to determine the unfair trade practices in the supply chain of agricultural and food products, the imposition of which exploits the considerable bargaining power of the buyer in relation to its suppliers, the procedures for determining unfair trade practices, as well as the cooperation between competent authorities for the implementation of supervision over the application of unfair trade practices. It is important to note that the Law applies to the sale of agricultural and food products where the supplier and the buyer are established in the RNM, EU member states or in third countries, to services that the buyer provides to the supplier, as well as to supply contracts with agricultural and food products, but does not apply to consumers
The law in article 4 contains definitions of the most important terms from which we would distinguish the definitions of:
- “Agricultural and food products” are the physical result of agricultural production as well as industrial product processing operations. Agricultural products and food products, in the sense of this law, include products from Annex I of the Agreement on the Functioning of the European Union, as well as products that are not in Annex I, but obtained by processing the products from Annex I of the Agreement on the Functioning of the European Union of the European Union;
- “Buyer” is any natural or legal person or public authority that buys agricultural and food products, that is, a group of these natural and legal persons;
- “Supplier” is an agricultural producer or any natural and legal person who sells agricultural and food products, i.e. a group of agricultural producers or a group of natural and legal persons such as producer organizations, supplier organizations and associations of those organizations;
- “Unfair trade practices” are contractual provisions and business practices that are unilaterally imposed by the buyer on the supplier in connection with the sale of agricultural and food products, using his significant bargaining power in relation to the supplier, contrary to articles 7 and 8 of this law
In Article 7, the Law defines the form and content, as well as the basic mandatory provisions and conditions that the contract for the supply of agricultural and food products and the prohibition of unfair trade practices should have.
The law defines the significant bargaining power according to objective criteria related to the total annual income in article 6.
Article 8 of the Law enumerates the unfair trade practices that are prohibited by this Law, regardless of the bargaining power of the buyer, namely:
- cancels orders for perishable agricultural and food products less than 30 days after the date of the order, so that the supplier cannot reasonably expect to find an alternative way to market or use those products;
- unilaterally changes the terms of the contract for the supply of agricultural and food products that are customary in relation to the method, place, time or volume of procurement or delivery of agricultural and food products, quality standards, payment terms or prices for providing services;
- requires payments from the supplier that are not related to the sale of agricultural and food products to the supplier;
- require payments from the supplier for damage and/or loss to agricultural and food products that are located on the buyer’s premises or after title has been transferred to the buyer, and such damage or loss is not caused by the supplier’s negligence or fault, unless the product is with a hidden flaw;
- refuses to confirm in writing the conditions in the supply contract for which the supplier has requested to confirm in writing, unless the contract for the supply of agricultural and food products covers products supplied by a member of a producer organization and a cooperative, to the producer organization of which the supplier is a member, if the provisions in their statutes have similar effects to the terms of the contract for the supply of agricultural and food products;
- unlawfully acquires, uses or discloses the supplier’s trade secrets;
- threatens the supplier with acts of commercial retaliation if the supplier exercises its contractual and legal rights, including submitting a request to the Commission for the Protection of Competition to initiate proceedings or a complaint or to cooperate with the Commission for the Protection of Competition during the proceedings
- seek reimbursement from the supplier for the costs of investigations conducted following consumer complaints regarding the sale of the supplier’s products, despite the supplier having no fault or error;
- requests compensation from the supplier for introducing a new agricultural and food product into the sales network and for expanding the customer’s sales network, arranging new and rearranging the customer’s existing sales points, expanding the customer’s storage capacity and expanding the customer’s distribution network;
- requires the supplier to agree on fictitious services that will not be performed, for which there is no reason other than delaying the payment deadline;
- requires compensation from the supplier for concluding a contract for the supply of agricultural and food products;
- requires the supplier to conclude contracts and business cooperation for compensation of agricultural and food products and services;
- requires the supplier not to sell agricultural and food products to other buyers at lower prices than those agreed to be paid by the buyer, and the supplier must not ask the buyer to buy products that he does not require;
- demands compensation from the supplier for reduced income of the buyer due to reduced sales or margin of a certain agricultural or food product;
- requires compensation from the supplier for the delivery of agricultural and food products to the place of delivery or outside the agreed place of delivery, except in cases where the buyer carries out his own distribution with his own funds and resources instead of the supplier;
- requires compensation from the supplier for market research regarding the supply and demand of certain agricultural and food products;
- unilaterally deletes the products from the list of agreed products that the supplier delivers to the buyer or significantly reduces the orders of individual agricultural and food products, without prior written notification to the supplier in a period shorter than 30 days;
- charges costs from the supplier for additional analyzes of the quality of agricultural and food products, unless the additional analyzes determine that the supplier’s product does not meet the agreed quality, in which case the costs of the additional analyzes must not be higher than the costs incurred by the buyer ;
- requests compensation from the supplier for services not provided;
- returns to the supplier the unsold agricultural and food products that were delivered without paying for them or without paying for the disposal of those products;
- requires compensation from the supplier for storing, displaying or placing agricultural and food products on shelves at the customer’s point of sale;
- requires the supplier to fully or partially bear the cost of discounts on agricultural and food products sold as part of a promotion;
- requires the supplier to pay for the advertising of agricultural and food products that he advertises;
- requires the supplier to pay for the marketing of agricultural and food products carried out by him;
- requires compensation from the supplier for the staff for furnishing premises in which the supplier’s agricultural and food products are sold and
- requires other fees and payments that it imposes on the supplier when concluding contracts for the supply of agricultural and food products.
The Law provides for the competence of the Commission for the Protection of Competition for the implementation and monitoring of violations of this law and provides for the same misdemeanor procedure as the Law for the Protection of Competition and its subsidiary application.