Trade and industry

Without trade and industry, people would have to create everything they needed to live. If you wanted a loaf of bread you would have to grow wheat, grind the wheat to make flour, mix the dough, and bake it in an oven. You would also need to build the mill and make the oven. Industry organizes the production of bread so that just a few farmers, millers, and bakers can make bread for everyone.

Industry supplies us with most other basic and luxury goods, from freshwater to computers. Trade is the process of buying and selling. The seller gets the products from the people who make them to the people who need them. And through trade, manufacturers can buy the raw materials they need to supply their factories and keep production going.

Goods that are traded internationally are called imports and exports. Goods that one country sells to another are called exports. Imports are goods that a country buys from another. In most nations, private businesses control imports and exports. But in others, the government imposes strict controls on what can be bought and sold

International trade goods move around the world by sea, land, and air. This international trade takes materials, such as oil, from the countries that have a surplus to those that have no or insufficient oil deposits. International trade is also important because goods do not always get a high price in the country where they are made. For example, many clothes are made by hand in countries where salaries are low. But the clothes are sold in another country where people are richer and can pay a high price. Money earned this way helps less rich countries pay for their imports.

• Some industry takes place in people’s homes, but workers in factories make most of the products that we buy. In a factory, each person has a small task in the manufacturing process. He or she may operate a large machine or assemble something by hand. No one person makes an entire product. This process of mass production makes manufacturing cheaper and quicker. Most factories are owned by large companies; a few factories are owned by governments or by the people who work in them.

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