Classification of Economic Activities: Industry, Commerce and Trade

The whole of business activity is conventionally classified into industry and commerce, and commerce is further split into trade and the aids to trade.

Industry covers all activities connected with the production, processing, or extraction of goods, and is itself of three kinds. Primary industries draw directly on nature and include (a) extractive industries -- mining, fishing, forestry, agriculture -- which extract or grow products from the earth, air, or water, and (b) genetic industries -- plant nurseries, animal husbandry, poultry and cattle breeding -- which are concerned with the reproduction and multiplication of living organisms. Secondary industries work on the output of primary industries and are again of two kinds: manufacturing industries (analytical, synthetic, processing, or assembling -- turning raw material into a finished or semi-finished product) and construction industries (building roads, bridges, dams, and buildings). Tertiary (service) industries neither extract nor manufacture but provide the support services -- transport, banking, insurance, warehousing, communication -- without which primary and secondary industries could not function efficiently.

Commerce is the branch of business concerned with the smooth flow of goods and services from producers to consumers, and has two components. Trade is the actual buying and selling of goods, and is of two kinds: internal (home) trade, confined within the borders of one country, further split into wholesale trade (buying in bulk from producers and selling in smaller lots to retailers) and retail trade (selling in small quantities directly to the final consumer); and external (foreign) trade, carried on across national borders, split into export trade (selling domestic goods to another country), import trade (buying goods from another country), and entrepot trade (importing goods from one country and re-exporting them to a third country, usually after some processing). …