The collateral economic damage that results from this form of local protectionism is vast, and worth noting.

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"There is still a certain level of local protectionism involved, " said Nauman.

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But such good-neighbourliness must be set against numerous cases of local protectionism.

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According to McKinsey, this local protectionism is the largest reason for the low productivity of Japanese retailing, with output per worker half the U.S. level.

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The main complaint was not the U.S. and European economies, but about taxes and fees charged by local governments, regional protectionism and tight credit, said Fan Gang, director of the National Economics Research Institute at the China Reform Foundation, which compiled the data.

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That test, says Mr Winters in his paper for the Commonwealth Secretariat, is like the crudest form of protectionism: prohibiting imports of goods where local supplies are available.

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But since the local-food movement looks suspiciously like old-fashioned protectionism masquerading as concern for the environment, helping poor countries is presumably not the point.

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The protectionism inspired the elder Chuang and his siblings to create Silver Queen, using local cocoa beans and cashews.

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