WTO chief finds hope in Trump trade disruption, sees chance for ‘reglobalisation’

The head of the world’s trade watchdog has delivered an upbeat take on US President Donald Trump’s unilateral tariffs – one of the biggest shocks to the global trading system since its emergence after the Second World War – casting the disruptions as a chance to cut supply imbalances, open new markets and spur “reglobalisation”.

A little over six months since Trump began slapping new levies on America’s trading partners, WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said on Wednesday that nearly three-quarters of global commerce remained governed by WTO rules, despite escalating tariff battles and repeated predictions of the body’s demise.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m excited about trade and what’s going on, even the fact that we have these challenges,” she told delegates at the WTO Public Forum, the organisation’s largest annual outreach event. “The opportunity is knocking at our door to do things differently,” she said.

Okonjo-Iweala acknowledged that the world’s trading system has been “heavily disrupted”, but pushed back against claims that the WTO had outlived its relevance.

“Over the years, the history of WTO negotiations has led many to pronounce its untimely demise,” she said. “Far from that, the WTO is alive. It is true the world’s trading system has been heavily disrupted, in a way it has not been for the past 80 years. But let’s not minimise the challenge.”

The new tariffs implemented by Trump, a long-standing champion of such measures, have reduced the share of global goods trade conducted under the WTO’s most-favoured nation principle from about 80 per cent before the measures to 72 per cent today, the trade body’s chief estimated.