Foreign trade has always been a crucial factor in Peruvian economic growth, sometimes as a major stimulus and sometimes more as a source of disruptive shocks. Falling external demand can set the whole economy back quickly, and at all times import competition can constrain the development of domestic industries. Many Peruvians believe that the society would be healthier and the economy more dynamic if foreign trade were tightly restricted. Many others favor taking maximum advantage of the opportunities opened up by external trade, even if the structure of production were pulled toward export specialization at the cost of greater diversification and industrialization.

Data as of September 1992