A longstanding voluntary agreement by manufacturers and importers not to advertise or promote infant formula will continue, the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission says. The Commission also raised concerns that signatories were reducing the agreement’s benefits through their marketing of toddler formulas.
The “Marketing in Australia of Infant Formula: Manufacturers and Importers Agreement” (MAIF Agreement) came into play to protect breastfeeding rates since 1992.
It is a voluntary agreement that restricts the advertising and promotion of infant formula by manufacturers and importers directly to the public and limits their contact with health care professionals. It forms part of Australia’s implementation of its obligations as signatory to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes (1981).
In its proposal to authorise the MAIF Agreement, The ACCC pointed out signatories, “also market toddler milk in almost identical packaging and branding to infant formula, with numbered ‘stages’, as part of a consistent product line.
“Because of these links, advertising for toddler milk can also promote infant formula. This has the potential to make the agreement less effective in protecting breastfeeding, and the ACCC is concerned about the extent to which this might be eroding the public benefits from the MAIF Agreement.”
ACCC chair Rod Sims said the ACCC was not in the business of setting health policy. “But when we are asked to grant exemptions to competition law we will only do so when we are satisfied that there are public benefits, which is why we’re seeking more information on this issue,” Sims said.
The Infant Nutrition Council applied for ACCC authorisation of the agreement because it may involve an agreement between competition which would otherwise be in breach of competition provisions of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010.
The ACCC can grant authorisation which provides businesses with legal protection for arrangements that may otherwise risk breaching the law but are not harmful to competition and/or are likely to result in overall public benefits, it said.
“Restricting advertising of infant formula in this way does restrict competition to a degree, but there’s a clear public benefit to allowing that restriction, so long as it is effective in protecting breastfeeding rates.
“However, if the industry is able to market in ways that ‘work around’ the restrictions, then the agreement will not be effective in what it’s intended to achieve,” Sims said.
The ACCC said its proposal to authorise the MAIF Agreement was not an endorsement that the existing arrangements are the best way to address issues around infant feeding and the promotion of breast milk substitutes, or that the MAIF Agreement was preferable to government regulation in this area.
Its role in this matter was to assess and weigh the likely public benefits and public detriments of the agreement for which authorisation is sought.
The ACCC invites submissions on its draft determination, including further information and evidence on the extent to which toddler milk marketing has the same effect as the marketing of infant formula and reducing rates of breastfeeding.
More information, including the draft determination and details on how to make a submission, are available from the ACCC’s public register at Infant Nutrition Council Limited.
