Case and Commitments

In February 2026, the BCA sent a Statement of Objections to Tiense Suikerraffinaderij/Raffinerie Tirlemontoise (RT) and its parent company Südzucker (see, VBB Belgian Antitrust Watch of 6 February 2026). The BCA found that sugar beet growers are economically dependent on RT and it took issue with contractual provisions governing the prices of sugar beet and beet pulp which RT had imposed on these growers. According to the BCA, these provisions gave rise to uncertainty regarding the growers’ income prospects and placed a “disproportionate share” of the sugar value chain’s commercial risks on them.

In response, RT offered commitments which addressed the BCA’s concerns and thus secured the closure of the case without a finding of infringement. While the decision is not yet public, the BCA’s press release described these commitments as follows:

• RT will amend several contractual provisions governing the purchase price of sugar beet and beet pulp and the exceptional adjustment of planned procurement volumes;
• RT will remove several contractual clauses making payment of part of the price of the beet subject to obligations pertaining to the following harvest year and transferring specific costs to the growers; and
• On this new basis, RT will annually negotiate with the growers specific procurement terms, “with a view to achieving a contractual balance following consultations characterised by dialogue, transparency and the effective consideration of the interests of the growers”.

These commitments will apply from the 2027 harvest year for “a minimum period” of five years (which suggests that the commitments may be extended or renewed).

Comments

While the BCA’s choice for commitments instead of an infringement decision may result from the specific facts of the case, it may also reflect the specific difficulties associated with the rules on abuse of economic dependence. The concept is vague and requires the demanding proof that the alleged abuse of the economic dependence affects the Belgian market as a whole (or in substantial part). While the law creating the abuse of economic dependence prohibition sought to bridge a perceived gap between competition law and fair market practice rules, it is sitting awkwardly between the two sets of rules. From this angle, a negotiated solution between the BCA and the party under investigation makes complete sense.

It remains to be seen whether the BCA will seek to develop a fully-fledged decisional practice on abuse of economic dependence, or whether it will instead focus on the existing and well-established antitrust tools at its disposal. Indeed, the cases of abuse of economic dependence most likely to satisfy the condition of affecting the Belgian market are those involving a dominant company. It may therefore prove more efficient for the BCA to rely on Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) (and its Belgian-law equivalent, Article IV.2 of the Code of Economic Law (CEL)) to tackle such cases.

Article 101 TFEU (and its Belgian-law equivalent, Article IV.1 CEL) could be applied if the company suspected of abusing economic dependence is not dominant, provided there is some form of contractual link between the allegedly abusive company and the firm being abused (the BCA does not necessarily impose fines on all parties to an anticompetitive agreement as the resale price maintenance cases show). From this perspective, the rules on abuse of economic dependence will remain relevant only in cases in which the allegedly abusive company is neither dominant nor contractually linked to its victim.