The EconomyChapter 19

Section 1

Agriculture and Fishing

• Only a small part of the territory in this region have arable land, or land suitable for farming.

• Countries in this region with a Mediterranean climate grow citrus fruits, grapes and olives and dates. Many of these crops are exported and rarely are they consumed by the locals.

• Wheat, barley, and corn are also grown in this region but do suffer when rainfall is below normal.

• Most countries that export citrus fruits and dates export them, and import other crops like wheat which could feed more people than the exported fruits.

Industry

• Most industries in this region center around energy, specifically oil and natural gas. 60% of the world’s oil is in this region, 50% of the Earth’s natural gas reserves are also in this region.

• It’s not just gas that is produced from the oil, compact discs, crayons, and house paint are also produced from oil.

- As an energy resource it accounts for half of the energy used world wide.

* It’s not just pumping out crude oil out of the ground, processing this crude oil in a refinery also created more jobs in the economy.

Transportation & Communication

• There are not a lot of roads in this part of the world with the exception of Turkey and Egypt. In some remote areas like the Caucasus, roads provide the only access to the outside world (no airports).

• Landlocked countries, or countries with no direct access to large bodies of water do not have access to sea for neither trade nor transportation.

Waterways

• The Suez canal in Egypt is an important waterway in this region linking the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea.

• The strait of Hormuz is also an important waterway in this region linking the Persian gulf to the Arabian Sea. Many of the worlds oil tankers will pass by the strait of Hormuz at some point to pick up oil from one of the OPEC countries that produce Oil.

The New Silk Roads

• In 1998, 16,767 miles of cable was put in this region following the path of the ancient Silk roads. For the first time in the history of 20 countries in this region, they now have modern amenities such as voice, digital, data, video and fax transmissions.

• The Transportation Corridor Europe-Caucasus-Asia or TRACECA, is a new network of road, rail, and air transportation linking the regions of Europe, the Caucuses and Asia.