Global trade is projected to grow by a modest 6.5% this year as uncertainties continue to persist in major economies like Japan, WTO economists said today.
For 2011, the economists are forecasting "a more modest 6.5% increase, but with uncertainty about the impact of a number of recent events, including the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. If achieved, this would be higher than the 6% average yearly increase between 1990 and 2008".
WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy too said: "The hangover from the financial crisis is still with us."
Lamy said that high unemployment in developed economies and sharp belt-tightening in Europe will keep fuelling protectionist pressures.
The short-term outlook is clouded by a number of significant risks factors in addition to the catastrophes in Japan, WTO said in a statement.
"These include rising prices for food and other primary products, and unrest in major oil exporting countries. Adverse developments in any of these areas could potentially set back the economic recovery and limit the expansion of trade in the coming year," it said.
It also said that India notched an impressive growth in global trade of goods and services last year. However, it continued to lag far behind China in these two areas.
India's goods exports increased by 31% last year, while its imports rose by 25%. India ranked 20th in global exports and 13th in imports of goods last year, while China remained the largest exporter of goods and the second largest importer in the same period.
In the arena of global commercial services too, China performed exceedingly well as compared to India which is supposed to be hub for the software services.
India ranked 10th in the exports and seventh in the imports of global commercial services as compared to China’s fourth position in exports and third position in imports.
Patrick Low, the WTO’s chief economist, said that the emerging economies continue to be the drivers of global trade with China’s exports growing by 28% last year. However, volatile oil prices which are expected to hover around $110 and persistent unemployment could pose a problem to continued growth in the global trade.
The WTO's preliminary data suggest that China is the largest exporter with $1.58 trillion or 10% of the world exports, followed by the US with $1.28 trillion, or (8% of world exports), Germany ($1.27 trillion) and Japan ($770 billion).
