World trade is expected to grow faster than expected in 2021. In its forecasts published on Wednesday March 31, the World Trade Organization (WTO) expects trade to grow at 8% this year, against 7.2% forecast in October . The 5.3% drop in 2020 was also smaller than feared.
- Better resistance than in 2008
It has withstood the plunge in the economy on the planet much better during the Covid-19 pandemic than during the financial crisis of 2008-2009. “The contraction of world trade was 1.6 times greater than the fall in GDP in 2020 against 7 times during the crisis of 2009”, observes Coleman Nee, economist at the WTO. As Sébastien Jean and Cecilia Bellora, researchers at the Center for Prospective Studies and International Information (Cepii) noted in a study published in November 2020, international value chains were less disrupted by lockdowns than by shortages. loans in 2009, which play an important role between commercial partners.
The gigantic stimulus plans in the United States and the European Union have, according to the WTO, “Boosted household income and supported the maintenance of spending on the purchase of all goods, including imports”. The various restrictions have led consumers to move away from services, such as recreation and tourism, in favor of goods and therefore global trade. “Many businesses and households have adapted to changing circumstances”, we add to the WTO. All continents saw their foreign trade decline in 2020, with the exception of Asia, whose exports increased by 0.3% and imports fell by only 1.3%. “Areas in which China has a comparative advantage did quite well last year,” observes Robert Koopman, chief economist of the WTO.
- The vaccine, the key to recovery
“A fair, rapid and global deployment of vaccines is the best stimulus tool at our disposal”, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, WTO director general, said on Wednesday. The Geneva-based organization notes that the outlook for world trade is nevertheless “Darkened” by “Vaccination schedules that are falling behind, especially in poor countries”. Seventy percent of the doses of the Covid 19 vaccine were given in just ten countries. A vaccine inequality that compromises the eradication of the virus from the planet and therefore economic recovery. It is not only the lack of factories that slows their production, but the border barriers in the health sector.
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