Several exporters of manufactures in Asia registered
a sizeable slowdown of growth in their external
trade. For example, between 2002 and 2007, the
volume of exports of the Republic of Korea, Thailand
and Malaysia increased by an annual average of
14 per cent, 10 per cent and 9 per cent, respectively;
in 2012, those rates fell to 1.5 per cent in the Republic
of Korea, 2.5 per cent in Thailand and 0.5 per cent in
Malaysia. This was the result not only of lower import
demand from E urope, but also of slower growth in
some developing regions, in particular E ast Asia.