616 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM activities and services of general interest where the population must be guaranteed certain minimum services, such as health, security and other activities, like the financial ones where, due to their importance, the State reserves the right to set certain requirements. In recent years, tourism has been increasingly considered by the states as an activity of public interest. Although it is not a limited activity, it has specific requirements that turn it into something restricted exclusively to a set of operators that must comply with strict requirements in order to provide tourism services. This is because the governing principles of touristic activity themselves, such as quality and accessibility, as well as the fact that touristic activity is considered as a third generation human right, makes it essential, on the one hand, for providers to comply with certain common legal aspects and requirements, and on the other hand, to have a strict control by the state through its Tourism Ministries or Agencies, intervening in the previous stages, during the life itself and even in the crises of tourist companies, thus preventing and protecting consumer rights. Hence, protection of competition may be defined as the rules of conduct of economic agents that promote free market competition for the benefit of both current and future consumers and users of goods and services. Furthermore, unfair competition may be constituted by those competition acts of an illegal or unfair nature (against the honest practices ruling commercial relations) of one competitor against the other, intended to attract or divert external clients, damaging that competitor. (Paris Convention) Hence, the purpose of competition rules is: • Ensure the efficiency of the productive system and rational allocation of resources between the different sectors. • Promotion of production, research, innovation and wealth distribution between the different sectors of the population. • Improve the quality of products and services. • To be an alternative mechanism to direct intervention in the economy, as is the case with price fixing. • To protect consumers. Public order. II. COMPETITION AND CONSUMPTION In this regard, we consider that protection of competition between operators must be focused on consumers, which are the weakest party in terms of the consumption
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