UNCTAD Handbook of Statistics 2000: a tool for economic decision making

By Our Corporate Bureau

CHENNAI, NOV. 24. Automobiles and petroleum crude were the most traded commodities in the world between 1990 and 1998, but the possibilities of a change in the composition of global trade are evident with the commodities fuelling the new economy - telecom equipment, office machines and automatic data processing equipment - registering rapid growth rates, according to statistics presented by the UNCTAD in its Handbook of Statistics 2000.

Where then is the new economy poised? Is the new economy, where wealth is created by harnessing knowledge to an open trading system, really driving economic growth and development in today's global economy?

According to a press release from UNCTAD, a quick glance at the world's most traded goods shows that there is more to economic development than computer chips and dotcom companies; information technology is indeed a large and rapidly growing part of the trading system, but traditional activities revolving around transportation remain dominant (Table 1).

It is hardly surprising that oil price hikes can still provoke uncertainty and disruption in an interdependent world.

Most developing countries are still heavily dependent on one, two or three items, as demonstrated by the Handbook's table of the most traded commodities of selected countries; clearly , the new economy has not yet migrated South.

The Handbook, intended to serve as a resource for keeping track of trends in the global economy, provides a comprehensive collection of compatible and comparable data relevant to the analysis of world trade, investment and development for use by government officials, researchers, international organisations and the private sector.

The data relate to international merchandise trade, including values, trends, structure and trade zones by product category, region and economic grouping; international trade in services; volume and terms-of-trade indices, as well as commodity price indicators; export and import structure by major commodity groups, by origin and destination, by commodity and by country.

Also included are international financial data showing current accounts, financial flows, foreign direct investment, external indebtedness and workers' remittances by country.

Among the indicators of development are GDP growth rates, select indicators of development such as those which reflect a country's status in education, health, access to information and other social and economic conditions, the release said.

The Handbook provides a consistent time series for individual developing countries from 1980 for their terms of trade and the purchasing power of exports.

The picture shows considerable variation and notwithstanding the low prices of oil prevailing for a major part of the past decade, the terms of trade of the least developed countries (LDCs) have steadily deteriorated, and in 1998 were some 19 percentage points below the 1990 level.

Are services the future engines of export-led growth? They certainly could be, but are not yet; the share of services in the value of total world trade has not changed much over the past decade.

It has risen by less than one percentage point, from 18.4 per cent in 1990 to 19.2 per cent in 1998. And the corresponding data for developing countries actually show a slight decline, from 16.8 per cent to 16.5 per cent.

Is regionalism the wave of the future? In fact, regionalism has been a rising trend for some time, particularly among developed countries; the share of intra-trade in total exports is already high among APEC and EU countries, and the 1990s saw a strong growth in North America. But the past decade also witnessed the emergence of subregional blocs in Latin America and Asia. So far only Africa has bucked this trend.

With its wide scope of statistical categories and indicators, the UNCTAD Handbook of Statistics 2000 is a tool for economic decision making.

It will serve those who need to grasp development trends quickly in particular countries and regions, as well as those interested in sectoral issues or global socio-economic processes. The years covered by the data range from 1980 to 1999.

The printed edition is part of the integrated presentation of UNCTAD Handbook of Statistics, conceived to contain the complementary versions like hard copy, CD-ROM and Internet.

To mark the change, a new title has been selected for this publication, formerly known as the Handbook of International Trade and Development Statistics.

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