Mike Moore, the director-general of the WTO, has made a call for increased trade liberalisation to help finance world economic development. He was speaking at the UN International Conference on Financing for Development in Monterrey, Mexico (March 21).

According to Moore, trade liberalisation can make a huge contribution to the generation of resources for the financing of development. He also emphasised the importance of increased capacity-building to help developing countries participate more fully in the global economy, but added that such countries urgently needed to reduce prohibitive trade restrictions that still exist between them.

For developed countries, Moore warned against trade restrictions in key sectors such as agriculture, textiles and clothing. He said that agricultural support payments alone cost $1 billion a day, adding that the average OECD bound tariff rate for agricultural products was four times that of industrial products. If restrictions were removed in this one area, the difference would mean more to developing countries than the total amount of aid donated.