Global Economic Activities: Agriculture, Industry, and Mining

Global Distribution of Economic Activities

Europe accounts for 8%, North America for 2%, Asia for 45%, and Africa for 58%.

Agricultural Activities

Agricultural activities occupy an important place because our food depends on this sector. These activities are developed in the agricultural landscape, characterized by:

1. Plot

• Shape, size, limit: Open field, closed field

2. Tillage Systems

• Harnessing the sun: Intensive, extensive
• Product range: Polyculture, monoculture
• Water management: Irrigated, dry

3. Settlement

• Sparse, centered

Types of Agriculture

• Subsistence: Itinerant cremation, extensive dry, irrigated rice
• Market: Opens in developed countries
• Objectives: Revenue + cost through field machining, production specialization, rapid commercialization of agricultural products

Livestock

• Traditional: Serves to complement agriculture
• Commercial: Production and sale for profit (intensive, extensive)

Fishing

• Use of animal resources of the sea
• Traditional: Near the coast, for self-consumption
• Industrial: Larger catches
  • Coastal: Small ships on the coast
  • Distant-water: Fishing in distant lands
  • High-seas: Large ships at sea
• Problems: Overfishing and pollution

Energy Production and Industry

1. Energy Production

Natural resources, energy transformation we get.

• Possibility of depletion: Renewable, non-renewable
• Economic importance: Traditional, alternative

2. Industry

Activities for transforming raw materials into products:

• Produced: Converted directly
• Semi-finished: Products to be part of the elaboration of others

Evolution of Industry

1. Background: Artisans manufactured products by hand
2. Formation: Manual labor replaced by machines
3. Now: Automation, reduction of labor, mass production

Types of Industries

• Produced goods: Heavy industry
• Use and consumption goods: Light industry
• Depending on the technical side: Peak industries

Company

Basic unit of industrial activity.

• According to size: Small, medium, large
• Organization: Limited partnership, Limited Company
• Capital source: Public, private
• Elements of the industrial process: Raw materials and energy, workforce, capital, technology, organization
• Major locations: Europe, USA, Japan, China, South Korea, Mexico, Brazil

3. Mining

• Open-pit
• Underground
• Mineral classification: Metallic, non-metallic, energetics