China to set up new prices, competition agencies to curb mkt manipulation, monopoly

China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country's top economic planner, announced Thursday that it will establish two offices dedicated to preventing anti-competitive behavior in markets.

The two offices, the Anti-Monopoly Office and the Market Price Supervision Office, will control monopolistic behavior and curb market manipulation, said Xu Kunlin, chief of the NDRC's Price Department.

The announcement came the same day Chinese authorities fined a number of farm produce traders in northeast China for conspiring to push prices higher.

Government agencies, including the NDRC, the Ministry of Commerce, and the State Administration of Industry and Commerce, jointly issued a statement Thursday saying a number of companies were fined because of their speculating to increase prices.

Xu Kunlin said wholesaler Jilin Corn Center Exchange Ltd., based in northeast China's Jilin Province, had invited more than 100 mung bean dealers from across China in October last year to a conference concerning the mung bean production situation in China.

The company later fabricated a report claiming "Output in major mung bean production regions fell 64.05 percent in 2009 year on year".

This, though, contrasts with the official figure of a 14.9 percent decrease, Xu said.


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