eZones

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The emergence of the internet as a medium for business exchange, will lead to the convergence of global trade, or will it?

Ask the heads of national government and leaders of trade and industry, what the internet actually holds for them and you will find a mixed response.

Many will state the convergence of trade will mean moves towards a truly global economy as goods, products and services can be displayed for sale 24 hours a day, 7 days a weeks, 365 days a year to anyone in the world who has access to the internet.

Others will state current method for nations trading goods and services will prevent ecommerce from really taking off, these methods are based on a mixture of:

Traditional economic relations - Over the course of time, businesses trade with other international businesses and develop good trading relations.
Bilateral trade agreements - One nation buys products from another nation on the basis they will also buy products from that nation.
Trade Restrictions - Regional national governments join forces to ensure the prosperity of their industries over other global economies, for example European Union, North American Free Trade Association, The Commonwealth, etc.
Trade embargos - As a result of some form of an earlier conflict, trade restrictions may be applied by either national or collective national governments against certain nations, for example Libya, Cuba, Iraq.

An eZone can be described as phrase detailing an area or geographical region which is excelling in internet growth/potential. Although the internet affects global trade, certain regions have benefited greatly, we shall now look at some of the major eZones:

NORTH AMERICAN eZone: By far the largest section of trade on the internet has come from the USA. The Americans enthuse the internet from both its development as a sales and marketing tool, together with programming potential of the major software companies, and the large mainframe/server companies that are based there.

The large industry and population base will ensure most of the goods distributed over the internet will have some form of American connection, indeed ADSL, ISDN, Cable Digital transmission systems are used to a much higher degree in the USA than in for example the UK.

EUROPEAN eZone: The single biggest threat to American global dominance is coming from the combined nations of the European Union. In terms of wealth alone, it is often quoted that the nations of the European Union hold the biggest amount.

Various inter-trading treaties such as the Single Market Act and the implementation of the Euro, will ensure Europe will be a large player in the internet, as it will aggressively promote European expertise, much will depend on how much regulation is enforced by it's parliament.

The success in European eZones, comes mainly from programming and innovational additional aspects to web design.

INDIAN eZone: When you think of India, you would not think of a country which has the highest level of programming capability in the world, would you?

India is fast emerging as the major service provider of the world, a highly educated computing workforce, has led to several global companies setting up regional centers in the country.

India is excelling in programming, data processing, and help desk support. As this country has such a high volume of computer programmers expect it's economic wealth and prosperity to rise rapidly.

JAPANESE eZone: Never under estimate the Japanese, despite many reports of an economic downturn in recent years, this nation excels in giving the world, the highest levels of technologically advanced products at the most cheapest prices.

Both from Japan itself and it's investment in surrounding nations will mean it will continually offer the world the practical hardware such as ISDN modems, monitors, computer memory, keyboards, hard disk, cd roms, DVD, IC's and other computer components at the lowest available price for some years to come.

RUSSIAN eZone: It is very difficult to see how in the modern global economy, how the Russians with their out-dated technology can actually survive in the marketplace.

Be very aware!, the Russians could well dominate the internet in a very short space of time, Russia through it's very appearance as a re-born-again economy could offer the technological innovations of the new Millennium. There are an extremely large number of highly skilled individuals in Russia, waiting to showcase their talent.

COMMONWEALTH eZone: Although the commonwealth nations have declined as a world power base in recent years, they do have a very large trading potential. Expect the more stable African nations, those which do not entertain years of civil unrest, to begin excelling in internet trade over the next decade.

CONCLUSIONS: Just how the internet will dominate our future remains to be seen. Certainly the internet will become the greatest medium of exchange of information, ideas and wealth across the world. However the attitudes of national governments will definitely determine the path of the internet both in terms of regulation (elimination of offensive web-sites) and in terms of economic regulations, there will come a point where transactions will be taxed, as national governments will see a lot of lost money in untaxed transactions, this in it's very self, could reshape the way the internet is used.

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