The 15^th of March is a special date for all consumers who celebrate the World Consumer Rights Day. On the eve of this important day the Warsaw School of Economics, together with its partners Federacja Konsumentow and Fundacja Konsumentow, organised the second edition of the conference “Consumer safety – a holistic approach”.

In the first part of the event the speakers representing the organizers as well as the governmental Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) pointed out that consumers now live in the challenging environment, especially with the growing trend of digitalization. Paweł Rokicki from Fundacja Konsumentow presented a new digital tool (Konsumersi.pl) that helps consumers to enforce their rights. Anita Szuszkiewicz from SGH presented the results of the Consumer Digital Empowerment Index. The positive impact of digital services on consumer empowerment in the market was highlighted in the speech. The presentation covered also challenges for the upcoming years, including reduction of digital exclusion in the society. The challenges should be addressed by the joint efforts of various types of market actors of both educational and legislative nature, as well as within the area of the enforcement of consumer rights. Such efforts shall lead to the growing consumer awareness and trust in digital services. Professor Bogdan Mróz gave an extraordinary lecture on current consumer trends, including digitalization.

In the second part of the conference, the parallel panel discussions were held on topics related to consumer safety on various markets. Some experts pointed out that the challenges in the new technology market are mainly due to low consumer awareness, information asymmetry and an ineffective system for monitoring and enforcing the law. They stressed the need for education and protection of consumers as the weaker party in the market, and unanimously agreed on the importance of hybrid solutions for market regulation – its self-regulation and solutions of an institutional nature, which should enable dynamic response to the challenges and new developments on the market.