THE FURNITURE INDUSTRY IN IRAQ BETWEEN IMPORT AND CONSUMPTION - BY APPLICATION TO THE CITY OF FALLUJA

Abstract

Industry is the backbone of any civil entity that aims to be economically stable and stand in the ranks of developed nations, and the researcher in industrial geography is usually interested in observing the most important facts about the industry in question in order to develop and elevate it. In this research, it has dealt with one of the types of industrial products which is Furniture that is indispensable by humans. Therefore, the furniture industry is one of the important industrial products globally, and the research presented its reality in Iraq through application to the city of Fallujah, one of the cities of Anbar Governorate, which occupies a central location in the province and the state. Fallujah includes 21 residential neighborhoods with about 112 factories or establishments working in the manufacture of metal furniture type, accounting for 54% of the total number of factories, which is the highest percentage of the number of factories for manufacturing wooden furniture in the city, which numbered about 51 factories only. The reasons for the geographical distribution referred to in the research maps by applying quantitative methods suitable for industrial geography; Where the indicators of industrial settlement were used, and the percentages and the arithmetic average were extracted for the raw numbers for factories, the number of workers, workers' wages, and industry requirements in order to determine the relative importance of that. Through the quantitative presentation of the furniture industry in Fallujah and linking this to the factors of industrial settlement, the researcher has concluded that the city of Fallujah is a city in which the furniture industry is settled. Because it is a primarily residential city that attracts internal migration in a large way, and it also has strong settlement factors such as the network of transport roads surrounding it and the centrality of the city in the country and that it is an area that attracts investment capital for the private sector in that industry in particular. The research has found that there is a close relationship between what Iraq faced periods of wars and economic blockade, and different governments pursue different approaches and the fragility of the Iraqi economy, which led to the adoption of the principle of import from abroad, as the national product is very fragile and of poor and noncompetitive raw materials, given that the climate in the country did not allow the cultivation of trees that have woods yield The research recommendations highlighted the necessity of activating interest in the national product, rationing imports from abroad, and cultivating modern trees with techniques that preserve the quality of wood in order to develop the furniture industry in Iraq.