Trade is aid. But: trade is also self-interest. Finally, as far as my non-economic brain understands it, growing a middle class in developing nations seems one of the best stabilising factors to prevent a nation spiralling back into poverty again.
It all depends on what framework of trade is achieved between countries, and in the nitty-gritty in the agreements. Neo-liberalism might be far from dead, still, sustainable, honest trade looks, to me, a boon to both "the west" and developing nations.
There is a lot of talk about frogleaping developing nations into sustainable commodities use, and I'm all for stimulating it. Yet I turn up the heat in my house in my neighbourhood in the Netherlands, where there is little insulation, a mediocre recycling scheme, a new coal plant being built in Rotterdam, a flush toilet wasting 10 litres of drinking water.
The development for reduction and recycling resources is in the first place in the court of the western nations, and not the developing nations who still look to western nations as an example how to get out of debilitating poverty - which is their right.
