The following is excerpted from a 30 May 2012 speech by Pascal Lamy of the World Trade Organization.
Director-General Pascal Lamy, in a speech to the Thai Chamber of Commerce in Bangkok on 30 May 2012, said: “Protectionism is like cholesterol: the slow accumulation of trade restrictive measures since 2008 — now covering almost 3% of world merchandise trade, and almost 4% of G20 trade — can lead to the clogging of trade flows.”
This speech is available in its entirety at:
http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/sppl_e/sppl232_e.htm