Exports up nearly 24 percent for WTO's poorest countries

Exports from the World Trade Organisation's least-developed countries (LDC) grew by 23.9 percent in 2011 to reach $229.8 billion (178.4 billion euros), the trade body announced Thursday. Sales of fuels and mining products contributed to the 2011 expansion, the WTO said, noting a 25 percent rise in both categories over the year.
A surge in commodities exports helped the LDCs reduce their trade deficit from $26.5 billion euros in 2009 to $3.3 billion in 2011. More of those exports are going to developing countries such as China and India. LDC exports to developing countries expanded more than seven-fold over the past decade to account for 52 percent of total exports in 2011.
Meanwhile LDC exports to developed nations shrank from 53 percent of their total exports 10 years ago to 41 percent in 2011. However the share of LDCs in global trade, both exports and imports, rose only modestly from 1.09 percent in 2010 to 1.12 percent in 2011. Despite the generally positive results, "a lot remains to be done" to increase the countries' share in global trade and combat hunger and poverty, said the representative from Haiti, the co-ordinator for LDCs. Of the United Nations' list of 48 least-developed countries, 33 are WTO members.