The Barter System
Class 7 Social Science · Chapter 11: From Barter to Money · NCERT Exploring Society: India and Beyond section 11.1
Learn
Neel forgets his eraser; Meher forgot her pencil but has a spare. They swap: her pencil for his extra eraser, and both are happy. That is the barter system: exchanging goods or services directly, without money. It was the earliest form of exchange, and evidence of it is found all over the world.
People also used commodities everyone valued as a kind of money: cowrie shells, salt, tea, cloth, seeds and cattle. On Yap Island in the Pacific, giant stone discs called Rai stones served as money; in central Mexico, copper axe-shaped blades; and on the Solomon Islands, coils of birds' feathers. Today we mostly use money, a tool everyone accepts for payments, as coins, notes or phone payments.
Explore: barter or money?
- Sort each exchange.
Remember
- Barter is the direct exchange of goods or services without money.
- Commodities like cowries, salt, cattle, stones and feathers were also used as money.
Quick check
Exchanging goods directly without money is called …
- barter
- minting
- banking
- taxation
Answer
barter. It was the earliest way to exchange.
Think about it
Why might cowrie shells have worked well as early money?
One answer
They are small, light, hard-wearing, hard to fake, similar in size and easy to count, so people could carry, store and compare them.
Practice
Practise with fresh questions at three levels (easy, medium, hard), some answered hands-on, with hints and worked answers. Get 4 of your last 5 right to finish the topic.