Although Japan, with its ambitious expansionary programme, may end up delivering a surprise performance, any recovery would be insufficient to reverse the trend of global economic cooling. Given that the developing countries drove around 90% of the global expansion over the last five years, any slowdown in the developing world amid would engender a global low-growth scenario, which is already being seen in weaker international trade (ECLAC, 2013b). In the context of higher GDP growth rates since the onset of the commodity price boom in 2003, domestic demand, and consumption in particular, has come to be a stronger driver of growth.