Geography · Lesson 11

Economic activities: agriculture, manufacturing & tourism

JAMBWAECNECO

What the syllabus asks

JAMB: Human Geography C(i–iii): types of economic activity, agriculture, manufacturing industry in tropical Africa, tourism

WAEC: Economic and Human Geography: economic activities: primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary; agriculture (types, factors, problems); manufacturing (with reference to tropical Africa); tourism

NECO: Economic and Human Geography: economic activities: primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary; agriculture (types, factors, problems); manufacturing (with reference to tropical Africa); tourism

What you will learn

Classify economic activities into primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary.
Explain the physical and human factors affecting agriculture.
Describe the main types of agriculture with world and African examples.
Describe fishing, lumbering and mining as primary activities.
Explain the factors of industrial location.
Classify manufacturing industries.
Describe manufacturing in tropical Africa with examples.
Explain the problems and prospects of manufacturing in tropical Africa.
Describe the importance, attractions and problems of tourism.
Answer data and essay questions on economic activities.

Key points

Primary: extracting; secondary: processing; tertiary: services; quaternary: knowledge.
Physical factors of farming: climate, soil, relief, pests, vegetation.
Human factors: capital, labour, market, technology, land tenure, government, culture.
Shifting cultivation moves farms and settlement; bush fallowing keeps a permanent village.
Nomadic herding: Fulani, Maasai, Tuareg; transhumance in West Africa.
Plantations: large estates, one crop, much capital, export.
West African cocoa is mainly peasant-grown; Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana gave about half of world output in 2023/24.
Commercial grain: Prairies, Great Plains, Pampas, steppes.
Fishing grounds: wide continental shelves with plankton; West Africa’s shelf is narrow.
Mining: open-cast, underground, alluvial, drilling.
Industrial location: raw materials, market, power, transport, labour, capital, water, policy.
Weight-losing industries locate near raw materials; perishable or weight-gaining near markets.
Tropical African industry: agro-based, import-substituting, concentrated in ports and capitals.
Problems: power, capital, skills, small markets, transport, imports, policy.
Tourism earns foreign exchange and jobs but can harm environment and culture.

Start here: Types of economic activity

Every morning in Kano, farmers head to their fields, workers enter textile and food factories, traders open their shops in Kantin Kwari market, and programmers log on in a tech hub. They represent four broad sectors of economic activity.

Sector	Meaning	Examples
Primary	Taking raw materials from nature	Farming, fishing, mining, quarrying, lumbering, hunting
Secondary	Processing raw materials into finished goods	Manufacturing (cement, textiles), food processing, construction, refining
Tertiary	Providing services	Trade, transport, banking, insurance, teaching, health care, tourism
Quaternary	Knowledge and information services	Research and development, ICT, software, consulting, data processing, media

Formal and informal activities

Economic activities can also be described as formal (registered businesses and government jobs, regular wages, taxes paid) or informal (street trading, roadside mechanics, okada riders, tailors, small food sellers). In Nigerian cities the informal sector employs a very large share of workers. It provides jobs and cheap services but often lacks security, pensions and safe working conditions.

Changes with development

In poorer, less industrialised countries a large share of workers is in the primary sector. As countries develop, people move into secondary and then tertiary and quaternary jobs (the “Clark–Fisher” model). In Nigeria, agriculture still employs many people, but services (trade, telecommunications, finance) now make up a large share of national output.

Worked example 11.1 (illustrative data)

A town has 40,000 workers: 14,000 farmers and fishermen, 6,000 factory workers, 18,000 in services, 2,000 in ICT and research. Find the percentage in each sector.

Primary = 14,000/40,000 × 100 = 35%.
Secondary = 6,000/40,000 × 100 = 15%.
Tertiary = 18,000/40,000 × 100 = 45%.
Quaternary = 2,000/40,000 × 100 = 5%. Total 100% ✓.

Linkages between sectors

The sectors depend on one another: cocoa farmers (primary) supply processing plants (secondary) whose products are moved by haulage firms and sold by traders (tertiary), while research institutes develop better cocoa varieties (quaternary).

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Practice questions

1. Farming, fishing, mining and lumbering are

primary activities
secondary activities
tertiary activities
quaternary activities

Show answer

A: primary activities
They take products directly from nature.

2. Manufacturing is a

primary activity
tertiary activity
quaternary activity
secondary activity

Show answer

D: secondary activity
It turns raw materials into goods.

3. Banking, transport and trade are

secondary activities
extractive activities
tertiary activities
primary activities

Show answer

C: tertiary activities
They provide services.

4. Research and information technology services are often called

extractive industries
quaternary activities
primary activities
secondary activities

Show answer

B: quaternary activities
They are knowledge-based.

5. Shifting cultivation is best described as

clearing a plot, farming it for a few years, then moving on
growing one crop for export on a large estate
rearing animals in a fixed ranch
farming with irrigation only

Show answer

A: clearing a plot, farming it for a few years, then moving on
Soil fertility recovers during the long fallow.

Key words

Economic activity: Any activity by which people earn a living or produce goods and services.
Primary activity: Obtaining raw materials directly from nature: farming, fishing, mining, lumbering.
Secondary activity: Processing raw materials into finished goods: manufacturing, construction.
Tertiary activity: Providing services: trade, transport, banking, education, health, tourism.
Quaternary activity: Knowledge-based services: research, ICT, information processing.
Subsistence agriculture: Farming mainly to feed the farmer’s household.
Commercial agriculture: Farming mainly for sale.
Shifting cultivation: Farming a plot until fertility falls, then moving to a new site (and village).
Bush fallowing: Rotating farm plots around a permanent village, leaving used land to rest.
Nomadic herding: Moving animals from place to place in search of pasture and water.
Plantation agriculture: Large-scale, estate farming of a single cash crop for export.
Mixed farming: Growing crops and rearing livestock on the same farm.

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