A slightly abstract simile illustrating the concept of interdependence as a food web (play foodweb game). Each animal is interconnected with other animals in the food web. The fox in this food web is the top carnivore, but it survives by eating mice and rabbits. It could not survive without its interactions with those animals. Similarly, without the fox, the rabbit population may become too large to be supported by the available food supply. This will destabilise the food web, to the detriment of both animals. Therefore ultimately the rabbit also relies on the fox. We can conclude that the fox and the rabbit are interdependent due to their direct connections and mutual connections with other organisms in the same system.
Geographically, in the globalised world in which we live, different countries and places in the world are interconnected by many different means such economic, social, environmental, cultural and political links. This is demonstrated in the image below:
For example, the UK is closely interconnected with countries right around the globe. The UK is an advanced economy, similar to the position of the fox in the foodweb. The UK economy depends on the flow of cheap raw materials from a less developed economy such as Nigeria. Equally, Nigeria relies on the UK in buying their raw materials, as well as adopting UK technology to extract the raw materials. Both countries my in turn rely on the finished product. Within the global economic system, this deep level of interconnectedness and inter-reliance leads us to conclude that the UK and Nigeria are interdependent.
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