Brief - Commissioner Kroes: zero tolerance for cartels 

During her hearing in the European Parliament last year, Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes had already promised that she would be very tough on cartels.

On 10 March, Kroes used a speech to a Brussels conference to announce that a new directorate to fight cartels will be set up in DG Competition. She told her audience that she sees "the creation of this new directorate as a very concrete expression of the zero tolerance policy the European Commission is committed to implement in the face of this most damaging type of anti-competitive practice".

Cartels are arrangements between competing companies either to limit production or fix prices.