Industrial Systems (Cambridge (CIE) IGCSE Geography)

Industrial Systems

• Industrial systems have inputs, processes and outputs

  • Inputs: basic items needed to begin the process 

    • Raw materials, labour, energy, capital, land, buildings, etc.

  • Processes: activities that take place to make a finished product (goods)

    • Cutting, sewing, welding, brewing, painting, steel moulding, etc.

  • Outputs: finished products, by-products, products for continued manufacturing elsewhere and waste

    • Finished products such as cars, clothing, beer, shoes, etc.

    • By-product such as Marmite from beer brewing

    • Continued manufacturing (part manufacturing) such as cleaning wool or cotton, weaving wool or cotton for material, material made into clothes for a finished product, etc. 

    • Waste is produced with all manufacturing; it has no value but creates a cost for disposal

• Manufacturing can be classified as:

  • Heavy: iron and steel manufacturing is heavy industry as it uses large, bulky raw materials on a huge scale, producing big items

  • Light: computer manufacturing, smart phone assembly, clothing, microbrewing, etc.

• Some industries need a lot of processes or processing, and this can lead to heavy pollution

Specialised steel production

• Input: alloys such as chromium and cobalt

• Processes: electric arc furnace, oxygen furnace, rolling and cutting

• Output: steel slabs, ingots, sheets, waste, slag and gases

• Impact: noise, dust, air pollution, smell and water pollution

Iron production

• Input: iron ore, coke, limestone to separate iron from impurities, water and recycled scrap iron

• Processes: blast furnace to melt iron ore, coke oven, rolling into sheets and cutting into lengths

• Output: cast iron, pig iron, slag, sulphur dioxide, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulphide, water and heat

• Impact: large building, noise, air pollution, smell, water pollution, contaminated cooling water, scrubber waste, risk of fire and explosions

• The sectors of industry are interrelated, and an individual industry will often use more than one sector to produce products

High-tech industry

• Fastest-growing industry in the world

• Most MEDCs and NICs have at least one hub of high-tech industry

• The industry has a high degree of research and development to maintain a competitive edge

• Manufacturing is mostly computer-automated

• Outputs include precision instrumentation, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, mobile phones, vaccines, etc.