Why don t the poor countries leave the WTO if it s not in their best interests?
They don t leave because they would face threats from the rich countries. The rich countries could say well, if country X leaves, we will no longer buy anything from that country, or even sell it anything. Country X would in essence be isolated, it would be unable to trade with almost any country, nor would it be able to sell its goods to those who buy the most, namely the rich countries, nor could it buy anything from them either. Let s see a pertinent example from a poor country. Imagine the case of Mexico if, for example, it left the WTO and the United States stopped buying its goods. Of everything Mexico sells abroad, almost all of it (90%) is sold to the USA. The same the other way around. Almost everything (90%) Mexico buys abroad comes from the USA. If the United States staged a boycott of Mexican goods, the country would suffer serious economic problems. In fact, after having joined the WTO, no country has left, precisely because of these types of threats.
