Global: World trade may have grown fastest in 2010

World trade is expected to have grown by more than 13.5 per cent in 2010, the fastest ever in global commerce, according to revised projections made by economists of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). 'This would be the fastest year-on-year expansion of trade ever recorded in a data series going back to 1950,' the WTO noted. The high growth figure, while reflecting higher industrial activities worldwide, is also a result of the severely-depressed level of trade in 2009, when world exports plunged by 12.2%, a WTO release said.