ABSTRACT
World trade is an unusually difficult concept to capture in data; on one level, the idea of an import/export is a simple matter. With any data set (presented in electronic or paper format), it is important first to examine the set for interesting or unusual patterns in the display. These patterns often influence decisions in choosing subsets of data and tools to analyze subsets. This chapter contains all the data within the World Resources Institute data base, for all available countries, concerning the trade of reptile skins. There is a real dilemma in further processing this data-in its present form, comparisons are meaningless because the sets are so different from each other. Thus, an exciting direction one might pursue in trying to establish order in this morass of missing data could involve concepts and tools from fractal geometry.
