What is the key difference between primary and secondary industries?

The key distinction between primary and secondary industries lies in their roles within the economy, particularly concerning raw materials and production processes. Primary industry is centered around the extraction of natural resources, such as mining, forestry, agriculture, and fishing. These sectors gather raw materials directly from the Earth, which will be utilized in later stages of production.

On the other hand, secondary industry is defined by the processing and manufacturing of these raw materials into finished goods. For instance, taking wood from forestry (primary industry) and transforming it into furniture or paper (secondary industry) illustrates this relationship clearly.

Understanding this distinction is critical for grasping how economies develop and how industries interlink from extraction through to finished products. The other options, while they touch on aspects of industry, do not accurately reflect the foundational difference between extracting resources and processing them.