How did trade between Nova Scotia and the West Indies improve the lives of the people?

Trade between Nova Scotia and the West Indies, which both produced diverse goods, played an important role in what was available to the people of both regions.  Nova Scotia shipped goods such as timber (spruce, pine, and balsam fir) and fish (haddock, mackerel, Atlantic salmon, and others) to the West Indies.  Merchants from the West Indies shipped goods such as rum and sugar cane to Nova Scotia.  People who lived in the West Indies benefitted from access to Nova Scotian goods, which they could not find at home.  The Nova Scotians enjoyed access to sugar and rum from the West Indies.

When Britain ruled the regions that made up the American Colonies, Nova Scotia, and the West Indies, trade was active and easy.  After the American Revolution when the United States became a separate country, trade relations between Nova Scotia and the West Indies strengthened.  Trade influence grew among merchants in Halifax.  Britain discouraged trade between the West Indies and the United States, but this did not stop it from continuing.  The United States produced a larger variety of goods because of more diversity in climate and landscape.  The options of goods available for trade were far greater in the United States than in Nova Scotia.