World wide trade

Trade:

 Trade has always been an important profession. Trade means the exchange of goods between people. We have seen how people working in their homes, workshops and factories are busy manufacturing different kinds of articles. 
Trade is a means of putting these articles in the hands of people who need them. In other words, trade is a bridge between the producers of goods and the users of goods. 

Requirements for Modern Trade: 

Fast and efficient means of transport and communication are essential for modem trade. The modern world is a fast-moving world. Cottage Industry: These are industries carried on by a few individuals or by the members of a family on a small scale. Machines used in cottage industries are generally light such as power looms, paper-cutting and printing machines and tool-making machines etc. 

Heavy Industry:

 

Industry

  

Factories which make machines etc. are known as heavy industry. To make machines we need metals and fuel. So the preparation of steel and the refining of mineral oil are basic to heavy industry. Countries that have developed heavy industry manufacture heavy machines like railway engines, electric machines, ships, aeroplanes and the like. 

To make these heavy machines, a country needs to have its own steel mills and its own oil refineries. Heavy industry also needs the services of a large number of skilled technicians and experts. This is why heavy industry is looked upon as the index of . a country’s progress. Sound industrial development depends on the development of heavy industry. .

 Light Industry and Foreign Markets: 

 Besides meeting the country’s own needs, light industry tries to capture foreign markets. This it/can do if it gets a plentiful supply of raw materials and can sell its products at moderate prices. The developing countries of Asia and Africa provide a big market for such goods. However, these countries are now trying to set up their own industries and turn their raw materials into finished goods themselves.
 This is just what Pakistan has done. Formerly it imported cotton and woollen textiles as well as sugar. Now it does not. Thus it has created thousands of jobs for its youth. It is also saving millions of rupees in the form of foreign exchange. In many countries farmers have to carry' their produce to the nearby market on the back of animals or in slow-moving bullock-carts. 
Transport and communications need proper streamlining so that the country may really benefit from the industrial development. 

International Trade: 

If the buying and selling of various articles is done not between individuals of the same country but between individuals of various countries or between the countries themselves is called international trade. 
Different parts of the world differ in physical features and climate. Naturally they produce different kinds of crops and prepare different kinds of goods. This gives rise to the need for the exchange of all kinds of goods between different countries. Each country exports goods which it can produce easily, at low cost .and in abundance. 
In exchange it buys from other countries, goods which it cannot produce or produces in sufficient quantity, or can only produce at a very high cost. 
Kinds of Goods Exchanged: 
 Goods exchanged between countries are of two kinds: raw material and finished goods. Raw materials fetch relatively low price. To manufacture goods one has to invest huge amounts of capital and make use of technical know-how. 
These factors make finished goods more expensive. Most of the Asiatic and African countries are largely exporters of raw materials. Their earning from these exports are quite low. On the other hand, Western countries export, for the most part, finished goods.
 Their export earnings are very high. How a poor country can develop? International trade in a way keeps reminding the poor countries of the world that it is not beyond them to catch up with the advanced countries.
 Determination, hard work and technical know-how can raise any people from the depth of misery. Modern China To take an effective part in international trade, it is important that a country should have something to export. It can only export that which is surplus. It must either have surplus agricultural produce or surplus mineral out-put or surplus finished goods. 
The only sensible course for poor countries is to develop modern industry. Belgium, a tiny European country, is almost as densely populated as Bangladesh. But it has developed modern industry. There is no hunger or poverty in Belgium. In Bangladesh, a great majority of people depend on agriculture. Hence poverty is growing there.