No 'indication' US will quit body under Trump: World Trade Organisation chief

Geneva: The head of the World Trade Organization said on Thursday he had had no indication the United States would move to leave the WTO under Donald Trump's administration.

"I haven't had any indication from anybody that that could be the case," WTO chief Roberto Azevedo told reporters.

During his campaign, which repeatedly attacked global trade deals, President-elect Trump called the WTO a "disaster" and said the US could quit the Geneva-based body.

Azevedo stressed it was premature to speculate on what Trump may do in office.

"I just don't know what the trade policies are," Azevedo said of the incoming administration.

"I haven't talked to him," he added, when asked if he had spoken to Trump directly since the November 8 US vote.

"What we have to do is be ready for a conversation" with Trump's economic team, the Brazilian national added.

Azevedo conceded that swathes of people worldwide had come to see global trade as a job killer even though such perceptions were not supported by evidence.

He said any fixes to the broader globalisation project must not include reactionary, protectionist measures.

"If the medicine is simply protectionism, the outcome will be that you harm the patient," Azevedo said.