There has been much discussion about the potential impact on the global economy of a Greek exit from the eurozone. Less debated is what effect a softening of Chinese demand, particularly for raw materials, could have on parts of the global economy.

A Chinese slowdown is likely to be less dramatic than a Greek exit. That is probably why no one has yet invented a silly term to match Grexit. (I’m offering “Chindown”, as in “keeping one’s chin down”.) Given the weight of China’s economy and its importance to some commodity exporters, perhaps rather more thought should be given to the topic. After all, unlike a Grexit, which no one wants, Beijing has actually announced its intention to engineer a Chindown. China’s five-year plan, which runs to 2015, talks specifically of weaning the economy off investment-led, commodity-hungry growth and easing the annual rate of growth down to 8 per cent from the double digits of recent years.

For several economies the stakes are high. Over the past 20 years, many countries’ trade with China has ballooned. In 1992 China accounted for a measly 0.9 per cent of Brazil’s trade. By 2010 that had shot up to 14 per cent. Other commodity producers have seen a similar explosion. Pakistan’s trade with China rose from 2.9 per cent to 13.5 per cent and India’s from 0.4 to 10.5 per cent.