The Analysis Of The Case Of The Unfair Competition Of Kelp Quota

Competition refers to economic activities of striving for commercial opportunities.Participants tend to take unfair competitive actions to snatch others’ commercial opportunitiesfor the purpose of maximizing their profits. The current Anti-Unfair Competition Law wasformulated in1993and has not been modified ever since. The stability of statues andeverlasting changes of society lead to inefficient regulation on many unfair competitivebehaviors. The current legislation cannot satisfy the demand of creating orderly faircompetition. As stated by Holmes, the life of the law has not been logic, it has beenexperience. The analysis of this case can provide precious experience and rewarding referencefor legal practices.The plaintiff Shandong Foodstuffs Import and Export Company (hereinafter referred toas Shandong Foodstuffs Company)submitted a plea to the court accusing the defendantSheng ke Company and Ma Da qing of snatching its commercial opportunity. This case hasthe following disputed points:(1) whether the commercial opportunity of exporting kelp toJapan can be protected by laws.(2) whether the defendant violates the prohibition of businessstrife duty and can be considered as unfair competition.(3) How to apply the law to unlistedunfair competitive actions in Anti-Unfair Competition Law; whether the general provisionscan be applied to settle this case. According to China’s current legislation, commercialopportunities are neither business secrets nor legal objectives of intellectual property. Civillaws and Locker’s labor property theory hold that commercial opportunities contain elementsof property which shall be protected by laws. Moreover, unfair competitive behavior, by itsnature, is a kind of action violates the good faith and common business ethics. Thedefendants’ behavior violated the good faith and prohibition of business strife duty. Given thecomplexity and variants of unfair competition actions, it is impossible to list all forms of suchactions in specific. In order to effectively regulate unfair competition actions, generalprovisions shall be applied in juridical practice. However, the first article of chapter one inChina’s current Anti-Unfair Competition Law cannot be regarded as a general provision froma strict perspective. Hence, it is imperative to consummate this article.The hysteresis and obscurity of legislation give rise to chaos in legal practices. A greatnumber of new forms of intellectual properties lack of protection and numerous unfaircompetition behaviors cannot be regulated. In the context of soaring market economicdevelopment, the Anti-Unfair Competition Law, usually regarded as the “Economic Constitution” has to be revised and improved urgently.