WTO slashes global trade growth forecast for 2022 to 3% from 4.7%

  • April 13, 2022
  • Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
  • Category: DPN Topics
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WTO slashes global trade growth forecast for 2022 to 3% from 4.7%

Subject : Geography

Section Mapping

Context: According to WTO sharp rise in commodity prices has been one of the immediate economic impacts of the crisis.

Despite their small shares in world trade and output, Russia and Ukraine are key suppliers of essential goods including food, energy, and fertilisers, supplies of which are now threatened by the war. Grain shipments through Black Sea ports have already been halted, with potentially dire consequences for food security in poor countries.

Apart from the Ukraine war, the other big factor affecting prospects of world trade growth was the continued lockdowns in China to prevent the spread of Covid-19. This was disrupting seaborne trade at a time when supply chain pressures appeared to be easing.

This could lead to renewed shortages of manufacturing inputs and higher inflation .

Concept:

  • The Black Sea also has a vital strategic significance to Russia. With Russia occupying its northeast shores, it is bordered by six countries – Ukraine to the north, Georgia to the east, Turkey to the south and Bulgaria and Romania to the west. Three of those nations, Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania, are members of NATO and that is a bone of contention for the Kremlin
  • It is supplied by major rivers, principally the Danube, Dnieper, and Don.
  • The Black Sea ultimately drains into the Mediterranean Sea, via the Turkish Straits and the Aegean Sea.
  • The Bosporus Strait connects it to the small Sea of Marmara which in turn is connected to the Aegean Sea via the Strait of the Dardanelles.
  • To the north, the Black Sea is connected to the Sea of Azov by the Kerch Strait.
  • The Black Sea covers 436,400 km2 (not including the Sea of Azov), making it the world’s largest inland body of water.
  • Access to the Sea of Marmara, and subsequently the Aegean Sea and Mediterranean is through the strait of Istanbul which connects Asia with the rest of Europe.
  • The Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits are controlled by Turkey and under the 1936 Montreux Convention, Ankara has the control to close the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits to all foreign warships in times of conflict.
  • Important cities on the coast include Odessa, Varna, Samsun, Sochi, Sevastopol, Constanța, Trabzon, Novorossiysk, Burgas, and Batumi.

Black sea ports

  • Port of Constanta

Port of Constanta
Port of Novorossiysk

Geography WTO slashes global trade growth forecast for 2022 to 3% from 4.7%