SHANGHAI (AFP) - WTO warns about growing competition for natural resources as world trade is expected to swell this year.

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The World Trade Organisation expects global commerce to grow 10 percent this year, WTO head Pascal Lamy said Friday, as the trade body released its annual report.

"Our forecast for world trade this year is plus 10 percent in volume after the minus 12 (percent) we registered in '09," Lamy told reporters.

Lamy made the forecast in response to a journalist's question as he released the WTO's 2010 World Trade Report on the sidelines of the Shanghai World Expo.

The report focused on growing competition for natural resources, such as fuels, forestry, mining and fisheries. The organisation said its report calls for more cooperation among governments in natural resource trade.

“I believe not only that there is room for mutually beneficial negotiating trade-offs that encompass natural resources trade, but also that a failure to address these issues could be a recipe for growing tension in international trade relations”, Pascal Lamy said in his foreword.

His forecast is up from a prediction of 9.5 percent issued by the WTO in March. World trade has rebounded after suffering its biggest collapse since World War II in 2009 due to the global economic crisis.