Quite simply, this has meant less international trade. Even so, China’s imports of many commodities continue to grow at double-digit rates. So, we have reason to expect global trade to grow more slowly than in the past: first, because global investment spending is in a lull, and second, because China’s economy is restructuring toward more domestic consumption and less trade.
We can certainly expect global trade to pick up when the world economy gets back onto a self-sustaining growth track, with stronger business investment. Still, as I just noted, cyclical factors can explain only about half of the trade slowdown, so we have more explaining to do.