UNCTAD BEGINS ESTIMATING LOST TRADE DUE TO COVID-19

FIRST CUT:  $50 BILLION LOSS GLOBALLY SO FAR; MEXICO 8TH MOST AFFECTED ECONOMY

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, which tracks global trade, estimates the coronavirus outbreak has cost global value chains $50 billion in lost trade, so far.  Click here for a summary posted by UNCTAD yesterday.

UNCTAD estimates the most affected sectors include precision instruments, machinery, automotive and communication equipment.  According to the report the most affected economies thus far are:  The European Union ($15.6 billion, the US ($5.8 billion), and Japan ($5.2 billion.  Mexico is listed as the eighth most affected economy, with a loss of trade up to now of over $1.3 billion, well ahead of Canada, 12th on the list at $660 million.

Click here for a more detailed set of data.  A chart of sectors affected so far shows Mexico has been hardest hit in the automotive and electric machinery sectors ($493 million and $341 million, respectively.

Click here for data on changes in shipping patterns since the outbreak.

UNCTAD has a long history.  Its first conference was held in 1964, and its first Secretary General was the Argentine economist Raúl Prebisch,  Prebisch was already famous at the time for his scathing critique of the global regime for trade emerging out of World War II which, he claimed, was rigged against developing countries because the terms of trade were unfavorable to countries exporting agricultural and other primary products.  His work inspired the Dependency Theory crafted by Carlos Henrique Cardoso (later to become President of Brazil) and Enzo Faletto, by Teotonio Dos Santos, Oswaldo Sunkel, Andre Gunter Frank, and others.  Another major theorist inspired by Prebisch was Johann Galtung, a mathematician who operationalized much of dependency theory in his influential article, "A Structural Theory of Imperialism."