The Role of Trade in Ending Poverty

The expansion of international trade has
been essential to development and poverty reduction. Todays
economy is unquestionable global. Trade as a proportion of
global GDP has approximately doubled since 1975. Markets for
goods and services have become increasingly integrated
through a fall in trade barriers, with technology helping
drive trade costs lower. But trade is not an end in itself.
People measure the value of trade by the extent to which it
delivers better livelihoods, through higher incomes, greater
choice, and a more sustainable future, among other benefits.
For the extreme poor living on less than $1.25 a day, the
central value of trade is its potential to help transform
their lives and those of their families. In this way, there
is no doubt that the integration of global markets through
trade openness has made a critical contribution to poverty
reduction. The number of people living in extreme poverty
around the world has fallen by around one billion since
1990. Without the growing participation of developing
countries in international trade, and sustained efforts to
lower barriers to the integration of markets, it is hard to
see how this reduction could have been achieved.