The Superintendence of Industry and Commerce imposed millonaire fines to several mining companies and individuals

The Superintendence of Industry and Commerce (SIC) of Colombia, in its role as national competition authority, imposed fines valued at more than 2,000 million pesos to eleven (11) mining companies and nine (9) individuals in the Department of Meta, after demonstrating that two agreements were carried out that violated free economic competition in the market for the production of construction materials extracted from the riverbed.

The first anti-competitive agreement consisted of the allocation of supply quotas, referred to by the offenders as “equitable distribution”. In this agreement, taking into account the number of mining titles that different people had in the area, it was agreed that 40% of the supply of stone material for the requests made by ECOPETROL's contractors would correspond to JOSÉ HÉCTOR MURILLO CASTILLO and SERVIPETRÓLEOS; and the remaining 60% to miners affiliated with ASOMGUACA. This practice was present from 2011 to 2016.

The second anti-competitive agreement sought to guarantee and complement effective compliance with the allocation of supply quotas, and consisted of fixing prices for stone material, year after year, from 2012 to 2016.

The participation of several whistleblowers in the Collaboration Benefits Program helped to dismantle the business cartel and the agreements reached by the offenders.