Trade monitoring

Trade is sometimes viewed as an economic activity that only favours larger companies. Certainly it is undeniable that trading internationally is often much more costly and difficult for micro, small and mediumsized enterprises (SMEs). The smaller the business, the bigger the barriers can seem.

Weaker demand in the developed countries limited the expansion of international trade in 2007. Consequently, world merchandise exports grew in real terms (that is, at constant prices) by only 5.5 per cent, compared with 8.5 per cent in 2006.