Its members continue to introduce more trade-facilitating measures than trade-restricting procedures on goods, an important signal of their commitment to keep trade flowing despite the current geopolitical uncertainty, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has stated.
Its latest Trade Monitoring Update, covering the period between mid-October 2023 and mid-May 2024 and available here, also notes a rapid increase in industrial policy subsidies, particularly in areas related to climate change and national security.
During the review period, WTO members introduced more trade facilitating (169) than trader restricting (99) measures on goods.
Most of the measures were on the import side. The introduction of new export restrictions declined significantly during the review period and, reversing a trend observed between 2021 and 2023, new import restrictions outpaced the number of new export measures.
Commenting on the findings, WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said: “Even in a context of rising protectionist pressures and signs of economic fragmentation, there are governments around the world still taking meaningful steps to liberalise and facilitate trade. This attests to the benefits of trade for people's purchasing power, business competitiveness and price stability.”
The average number of trade remedy initiations increased during the review period (24.6) after years of a declining trend. Almost 90% of the investigations recorded were initiated by G20 economies.
Anti-dumping continued to be the most frequent trade remedy action, accounting for 70.3% of all initiations and 93.9% of all terminations.
The implementation of new Covid-19 trade-related measures on goods, services, intellectual property, as well as government support measures related to Covid-19 by WTO members continued to decline.
