PART 1: MARKET STRUCTURE & COMPETITION IN AUSTRALIA

In 2020, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) launched Federal Court proceedings against Australasian Food Group (AFG), which trades under Peters Ice Cream, alleging the company engaged in anti-competition behaviour between 2014 and 2019. It was alleged that Peters entered into an exclusive agreement with food delivery company PFD Food Services to distribute its single-wrapped ice cream and frozen confectionary products to petrol and convenience retailers nationally during this period. Peters also rejected requests made by PFD to distribute competing ice cream products to the same petrol and convenience retailers that sell Peters' single-wrapped ice cream and frozen confectionary products.

Questions

Research and write up the background of this case study on ACCC's position and AFG's (also known as Peters Ice Cream) position in regard to this exclusive dealing in no more than 300 words.

Conduct an economic analysis on the ACCC's concerns and rationale behind its decision to launch legal action against AFG (Peters Ice Cream). (Note: include market structure, competition policy, firm behaviour, consumer surplus, producer surplus, deadweight loss and market efficiency in your group's discussion and analysis).

Identify and justify the type of market structure ACCC wants to promote for the single serve ice creams.

If AFG (Peters Ice Cream) purchased and merged with the other major supplier of single serve ice creams to become a dominant seller in the market of single serve ice creams, illustrate and explain using a diagram the impact this acquisition and merger has on price, quantity and deadweight loss as compared to the market structure identified in Q3 above.