answers: North American fur trade
context: the 16th and early 17th centuries New France's economy was heavily centered on its Atlantic fisheries. This would change in the later half of the 17th and 18th centuries as French settlement penetrated further into the continental interior. Here French economic interests would shift and concentrate itself on the development of the North American fur trade. It would soon become the new staple good that would strengthen and drive New France's economy, in particular that of Montreal, for the next century. The trading post of Ville-Marie, established on the current island of Montreal, quickly became the economic hub for the </s> presence in New England grew stronger, while the French were occupied with trying to combat the "coureurs de bois" and allied Indians from smuggling furs to the English for often higher prices and higher quality goods than they could offer. In 1675, the Iroquois made peace with the Machian while finally defeating the Susquenhannock. In the late 1670s and early 1680s, the Five Nations started to raid what is now the Midwest, battling the Miami and the Illinois while alternatively fighting against and attempting to make an alliance with the Ottawa. One Onondaga chief, Otreouti, whom the French called "La </s> Grande Gueule" ("the big mouth"), announced in a speech in 1684 that the wars against the Illinois and Miami were justified because "They came to hunt beavers on our lands...". Initially, the French took an ambivalent attitude towards the Iroquois push west. On one hand, having the Five Nations at war with other nations prevented those nations from trading with the English at Albany while on the other hand, the French did not want to the Iroquois become the only middlemen in the fur trade. But as the Iroquois continued to win against the other nations, prevented French and Algonquin
question: which economic activity in new france created the greatest amount of income for france