AI Seen Powering 40% Surge in Global Trade by 2040

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Artificial intelligence could add nearly 40% to the value of cross-border trade in goods and services by 2040, provided the right policies are in place, according to the 2025 World Trade Report released by the World Trade Organization (WTO).

The report projects that global trade could increase by 34–37% and global GDP by 12–13% under various scenarios. Productivity gains and lower trade costs driven by AI are expected to underpin this growth.

But the WTO cautions that without action to close the digital divide, invest in workforce skills, and maintain open trade, the benefits of AI risk being unevenly distributed. “Access to AI technologies and the capacity to participate in digital trade remains highly uneven,” WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala wrote in her foreword.

Trade in AI-enabling goods, including raw materials, semiconductors and intermediate inputs, reached USD 2.3 trillion in 2023. Yet access is restricted in many markets: quantitative restrictions on AI-related goods have grown from 130 in 2012 to nearly 500 in 2024, and tariffs in some low-income economies are as high as 45%.

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The report warns that inequality within economies could widen without stronger education, training, and labor market policies. It also highlights the WTO’s role in fostering inclusive access, noting that 80 specific trade concerns related to AI have already been raised by members. Expanding participation in agreements such as the Information Technology Agreement could help make AI more affordable and accessible, it says.

The report was launched on September 17 at the WTO Public Forum in Geneva. Opening the event, Okonjo-Iweala described AI as a “bright spot” for global growth amid the most severe trade disruptions in eight decades.