Dr Kim said that if developed countries start throwing up trade barriers, ambitious targets to eradicate poverty by 2030 could be missed because global economic growth would be slower.
"It will be much, much harder to achieve [the poverty targets], there's no question," Dr Kim told me.
"We can build all the infrastructure we want and we can increase trade among the emerging market countries, [but] at the end of the day if global trade does not grow at a more robust rate it is going to be very hard to make those targets."If all the developed countries close their borders, it's going to be very difficult and it's going to be very difficult for those countries as well." I asked him directly if the target could be missed. "We very well could, absolutely, it's possible," he said.