1. Dr. Susan P. Mains, Geography
GE21001 Dynamic Human Worlds Economic Geography, Lecture 2: Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
Dr. Susan P. Mains, Geography

2. Lecture Outline Defining Economic Geography
The Story of Bottled Water (2010) with Annie Leonard
Producers
Products
Places
Consumers

3. Defining Economic Geography
What is economic geography?
Why is it important?
How are people, economics and places interrelated?

4. Defining Economic Geography
Economics: the study of how societies distribute limited resources
Economic Geography: studies the locations, spatial organizations, and forms of activities related to the distribution of limited resources

5. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
What is the ‘stuff’ of the economy?
Everything that people produce in whatever WORK they do
Material goods (stuff we can touch): food, shelter, clothes, phones, art, jewellery, etc
Services (things we do but can’t touch): teaching, childcare, healthcare, accounting, entertainment, administration, etc.

6. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
The Economy in Your Neighbourhood
What work do people do in your neighbourhood (paid and unpaid)?
What things do people consume to stay alive?
What is being produced? What happens with the extra products or profits? Are they reinvested in the local economy?
How do people and businesses finance their bills? Where do they get the money?
Is the local environment healthy or being degraded?

7. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
The Story of Bottled Water
Producers:
drinks beverage makers
multi-national corporations
‘footloose’ industries
Small scale producers
Economies of scale

8. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
Meeting a demand for a good or service
Creating a demand for a good or service
Diversifying products
Limiting range of products
Fashion—conspicuous consumption
‘shelf-life’

9. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
Where are the sites of production?
Who consumes goods and services and where are they?
How do goods and services travel?
What if they can’t travel?
Where do they end up
How do legislation/markets/tastes in different places influence what is bought and sold?

12. "One World: One Taste" McDonalds, undated

13. Living on up to $10
Territory size shows the proportion of all people living on US$10 purchasing power parity or less a day worldwide, that live there.
"There is no work here, and when you do find a job, you earn pathetically low wages. I'm a factory watchman, and I earn the equivalent of eight dollars for a 12-hour day." Pirana, 2005

14. Living on up to $10
“In Indonesia US$10 buys more than it does in the United States, so comparing earning in US$ alone does allow for the cost of living changing between places. The map shows purchasing power parity (PPP) - someone earning PPP US$10 in Indonesia can buy the equivalent of what PPP US$10 would buy in the United States. As such more practical assessments of individuals’ earnings can be made.
In 7 out of the 12 regions more than half of the population live in households where the people live on below PPP US$10 a day. In Central Africa 95% of households have workers earning this little; in Western Europe and Japan less than 1% of the population does. “

15. Living on over $200
“In 2002, 53 million people in the world lived in households in receipt of US$200 purchasing power parity (PPP) per day. Of these high earners, 58% lived in the United States.
Western Europe and South America are also home to quite large populations of high earners. Within Western Europe the most very high earners live in the United Kingdom, Italy and France. The highest earners of South America live primarily in Brazil and Argentina.
Few very high earners live in Southern Asia, Northern Africa, Eastern Europe and Central Africa.”

16. Living on over $200

17. Producers, Products, Places and Consumers
Who consumes goods and services and where are they?
Who are the biggest producers and who are the biggest consumers?
Where are the inequalities in consumption?
Environmental, social and political impacts of consumption?
How are images of place utilised by producers and consumers?
How might these be challenged?