Chapter 4, Section 4Resources, Trade

and the Environment

Economic Development• Most natural resources are NOT evenly

distributed throughout the earth.

• This uneven distribution affects the global economy, and as a result, countries specialize in the economic activities best suited to their resources.

• Geographers and economists classify all of the world’s economics into 4 types:

• involve taking or using natural resources directly from the earth. They include farming, grazing, fishing, forestry, and mining.

• take place near the natural resources that are being gathered or used. For example, coal mining occurs at the site of a coal deposit.

Primary Economic Activities

• use raw materials to produce something new and more valuable. –Ex: manufacturing automobiles,

assembling electronic goods, producing electric power, or making pottery.

• These activities occur close to the resource or close to the market for the finished good.

Secondary Economic Activities

• do not involved directly acquiring and remaking natural resources.

• Instead, they are activities that provide services to people and businesses. –Ex. Doctors, teachers, lawyers, truckers,

and store clerks all provide professional, wholesale, or retail services.

Tertiary Economic Activities

• are concerned with the processing, management & distribution of information.

• They are vitally important to modern economies that have been transformed in recent years by the Information (computer) Revolution.

• People performing these activities include “white collar” professionals working in:– Ex. education, government, business, information

processing, and research

Quaternary Economic Activities