1.Agricolture
| The USA has immense agricoltural resources. Major crops include tobacco, cotton, corn and wheat, dairy and livestack (huge productions of beef, pork, poultry, as well as fish). One half of the land is dedicated to farming with about 20 percent being used for producing crops and the rest for raising animals. |
| Farms tend to be concentrated in large holdings where the most up-to-date farming methods are used. The main farming regions are: |
- the corn belt which stretches from Nebraska to Ohio and Minnesota to Missouri. It is ideal farmland for corn, thanks to its hot, humid climate, nut the corn belt also produces a variety of other cereals;
- the wheat belt is a flat area with a dry climate, which lies of the corn belt and covers most of the central part of the country, with Kansans and North Dakota as chief producers. Because of its huge output of grain, this area os known as the 'bread basket' of the USA;
- the cotton belt lies in the south from South Carolina to Texas;
- the dairy belt goes south from the Great Lakes to New York. Here the rearing of diary cattle is widespread;
- the tobacco belt with Kentuchy, South Carolina, Virginia and Tenessee provides a high percentage of the whole world's production. ù
Carolina and Florida, with their hot, humid climates are famous for a variety of friut and vegetables - from citrus friuts to melons and strawberries, from beans to vegetables. The Californian wine industry as also becoming very competitive. |
| Fishing is also a major economic activity. The long coastlines, located at different latitudes, and the currents of various kinds allow a great variety to live in the water. |
2.Industry
| The industrial output of the USA is the highest of any country. It is the leading producer of chemicals, textiles and processed food and the second largest producer (after Japan) of machinery and transport equipment. |
| Massive effort adn capital have shifted to new technology sectors, such as spacecraft, electronics, telecommunications and nuclear energy-based industries. Information technology has been by far the most important industry to develop in the recent past. |
| The centre of this industry is CAlifornia's Silicon Valley. |
3.Natural resources
| The USA os phenomenally rich in energy, but still imports fuel to meet the needs of its massive economy. It is only one of the world's three biggest producers of energy (the other two being Russia and China) to be in this situation. This markes the USA at the same time the world's largest producer and the the world's largest importer of energy. |
| Oil fields are located in Texas, Louisiana, California and Alaska. The USA is the largest producer and the largest consumer of oil. Despite its huge prodection, oil is one of its major imports. |
| Natural gas is extracted in Louisiana, New Mexico and Alaska. |
| Coal is mined in the eastern states of Kentuchy and Pennsylvania, in Illinois and Ohio. |
| Hydroelectric power is another major source of energy. The USA gets 18.9 percent of its electricity supply from nuclear energy. |
| The USA has also copious supplies of mineral resources. It is among the five biggest producer of copper, lead and zinc, iron ore, silver and gold. |
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4.Services
| The servis sector includes banking, insurance and financial trading. |
| The USA also recieves more tourist per year than any other country exept France. Pop culture and the media - films and TV programmes - are another major source of income for the USA. |
5.Finance
| The Federal Reserve |
| The USA's central bank is the Federal Reserve, popularly known as the 'Fed'. It is independent of the government. It consist of twelve banks, each responsable for a region of the country, overseen by a board of governors in Washington who are appointed by the President. The Federal Reservere controls the money supply and regulates bank credit through open-market trading, by raising or lowering the rates of interest it charges and by adjusting the percentage of the capital which commercial banks must deposit with the Fed. |
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| The Stock Exchange |
| The USA has two larg stock exchange: the famous New York Stock Exchange, on Wall Street in New York, and the NASDAQ (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations), also in New York. There are other, smaller Stock Exchanges where shares are bought and sold in companies which are not registred on iether of the large Stock Exchange. |
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| Foreign trade |
| The USA is one of the largest importeres and exporters in the world. Merchandise exports rose by 13 percent in 200 while merchandise imports rose by 19 percent.. This means that the USA trade deficit stands at nearly $450 bilion. The main imports are crude oil and refined petroleum products, machinery, cars, consumer goods, industrial raw materials and food and beverages. The main exports are manufactured products including machinery, aeroplanes and vehicles,; chemicals and scientific instruments. As oil is one of the main imports, any rise in oil prices becomes a cause of concern. Political instability in the Middle East lead to further price increases which would have severely negative effects on both the USA World economies. |
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