Rich Countries Trade with Each Other
Rich countries are mostly trading with each other. China, with about 1/4 of the world’s population, produces less than 4% of the world’s exports. Mexico exported less than Belgium in 2000. India, with a billion people, produced less than 1% of world exports. And these figures are for physical merchandise: developing countries contribute even less to the trade in commerical services.
North American imports from the least developed countries were only 0.6% of total imports in 2000, down from 0.8% in 1980. And 0.5% of Western Europe’s imports in 2000 were from these countries, down from 1%. For Japan, the figure is 0.3%, down from 1%. For all the major world traders put together, the percentage of their imports from the least developed countries is 0.6%, down from 0.9% 20 years before.
The Undercover Economist, Tim Harford