Britain is the sixth richest country in the world. We have an enormous economy and every year, thousands of people cross the border in search of a new life. So why on Earth do newspapers insist on banging on about Britain's debt and the deficit? Is austerity really necessary? Do we really have to worry about it? If we close our eyes, won't it just go away?

Well, no – unfortunately it's not that easy. Britain's debt problem has reached crisis point, and austerity is one way of ensuring that the problem doesn't go any further, and that some steps are taken to sort it out. The problem is largely down to the politicians – although Labour inherited a healthy economy in 1997, it was in dire straits by the time Gordon Brown left office in 2010. This was due to Labour's spending splurge, which vastly outweighed the country's income. Labour's argument was that the country would continue to attract money as long as growth continued in the economy. The plan would have been sustainable had the financial sector – upon which Britain's economy is primarily reliant on – not suffered an enormous crash in 2008.

With wallets tightening, banks struggling and the euro crumbling, you'd be forgiven for thinking it a bad time to invest in a new business. And that's true for many industries – you'd be rather foolish to start setting up a bank in Spain at the moment. If you want to invest in a new business and don't want to wait for the times of austerity to end, then there are some dependable industries that you could go into which keep delivering – no matter how bad things get.

Confectionary – When wallets tighten, belts follow suit, it seems. Confectionary is a business which will always achieve growth in a recession. Chocolate in particular is a comfort food, and one that people will buy more of when they have to cut other more expensive treats for themselves such as holidays.

Healthcare – It's a well-known fact that people won't stop getting ill simply because there is a recession on, and the NHS and private hospitals will always need new machines, staff and doctors to take care of them.

Recruitment – Specifically temporary staffing firms appear to be doing well in the recession, as more out-of-work people are coming to them for temporary positions, and more companies are reducing their permanent payroll in favour of part-time or temporary staff.

Repair services – It's definitely a sign of the times when repair services are on the up; people are seeking to repair broken possessions that they would simply replace if they had the cash flow.

Brazil, along with Mexico, has long been at the forefront of Latin American economics. Indeed, it's been on the up, competitively, since 2009. Steps taken in the 1990s to make the economy sustainable have provided a much better environment for private-sector development, and it is even a pioneer in many fields, such as ethanol development. Currently, it is the sixth largest economy by nominal GDP, and it is expected to be the fifth by the end of 2012.

Like many economies currently booming, Brazil's economic income is highly diversified. Agriculture and food production account for 8%, whilst industry accounts for 28.5% - ranging from automobiles, steel, aircraft and many more. It has also pioneered new techniques in deep-water oil extraction – a necessity due to the fact that as much as 73% of reserves in Brazil are extracted from under deep water. Furthermore, Brazil is self-sufficient for energy, using a mixture of nuclear power, gas and oil to provide its population with electricity. It is also a leading pioneer in hydroelectric methods, and it is home to the world's largest power-providing dam.

India – the eleventh largest economy on the planet, and one of the fastest-growing economies in the entire world. Aided by a workforce of around 487.6 million, the country is the nineteenth largest in terms of exports, and accounts for 1.5% of the world's trades, as estimated in 2011. Their major agricultural products include rice, wheat, tea, sugarcane, cattle and water buffalo, but they also have enormous output in industry, finance, energy and power. The economy is aided by the world's third largest road network, as well as the fourth largest rail network, and economic growth rates are predicted to be 7% for the 2011 – 12 fiscal year.

But even India hasn't been able to sustain its success throughout the recession, and its highest growth rates were in the mid-noughties. The reason for the growth was put down to an increase in middle-class consumers and foreign investments. The success can be credited – somewhat late, admittedly – to ex-foreign minister Manmohan Singh, who created strong economic reforms which led to very high growth rates and consequently increased incomes to much of the population. And although growth has slowed in recent years, the 7% prediction is still impressive, considering the UK and US governments would be excited at the prospect of any growth whatsoever.

So how is the country succeeding where others are failing? Unlike Britain and the US, India has an enormous and varied export rate – something which keeps people in jobs, and keeps income to the country when a recession is in action. After all, other countries will always need to purchase livestock and milk, and India has the second largest cattle population and is the largest producer of milk. The country ranks second in worldwide farm output, and its farming industry employs around 52% of its total workforce.

There are many ways to rise to the top of the business world. While the vast majority of the world's richest people go unrecognised by members of the public (Carlos Slim Helu is hardly a household name, despite being the world's most wealthy man with a $69Billion dollar fortune) there are also a number of businessmen who have achieved celebrity through their business career. One could even argue that they are the most successful celebrities of them all, as the majority own companies which have thousands of fanatics and repeat customers.

Richard Branson, for example, is famed for his outrageous lifestyle and willingness to star in the adverts of his company – always in a tongue-and-cheek fashion. He is rarely out of the papers for long, having recently opened the world's first commercial spaceport in New Mexico (abseiling down the side of the building popping champagne, no less) and buying the UK's nationalised bank Northern Rock for his company. His self-made journey has also been an attraction – having dropped out of school at 16, he proceeded to become one of the most successful businessmen in Britain.

Equally, you can't invent the world's most used operating system and get away with it. Bill Gates, the creator of Microsoft, is worth approximately $61 Billion as of March 2012. But he is not only known for his achievements in computing – far from it. Perhaps his most prominent work is his philanthropic efforts, which have helped eliminate polio in India, spearheaded an effort to eradicate malaria, and committed over $2billion to small farmers. He is also frequently parodied on the radio, television and in popular culture.

He's currently a member of the House of Lords, the focus of a long-running television series on the BBC, and the owner of a fortune worth an estimated £770 million. He's an incredibly well-known figure – swarthy, smart and sophisticated, but you don't want to be told to get your bags and leave by this Essex lad. Guessed who we're talking about yet?

Sir Alan Sugar is the gentleman in question. Certainly he's a high-profile businessman – he's even been awarded a knighthood for his services to the field. But here are a few interesting titbits which may or may not be related to his business career. Watch as we discover exactly how the man behind Amstrad had branched out.

Sugar started his business life after leaving school at 16, and working for the civil service as a statistician at the Ministry of Education. He saved up enough to purchase a van, out of which he began selling electrical goods after quitting his job.

Sugar is an enormous fan of classic Rolls Royce and Bentley cars, and owns several. Some have featured in the hit series The Apprentice, along with Sugar himself.

As well as classic cars, Sugar also holds a soft spot for the football club Tottenham Hotspurs. He even chaired the club for 10 years, from 1991 to 2001.

Although Sugar looks harsh on his television programme, he actually likes to spread his money around – particularly to needy causes. He has donated large sums of cash to Jewish Care, Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital and also to the Labour Party.

His political career started in 2009 when he was given a peerage by the Prime Minister of the time Gordon Brown – the role of enterprise tsar. As well as Lord Sugar, he is also called Baron Sugar of Clapton as a result of this.

Sugar has also presented a documentary on the financial woes of English football, for the BBC.

Star Wars: The Phantom Market. Showing at all good cinemas near you. It's a thrilling chase in which a plucky company chases down a phantom market armed with a lightsaber, only to find that the market is no longer there, and the company has wasted an awful lot of money. Well, not exactly. It's not a real film. Which is a bit of a shame, as if breakfast cereal giant Kellogg had been able to watch it, they might have learnt a bit of a lesson. It would have certainly saved them a bit of cash, as this story will explain.

Back in the early 1990s, Kellogg was riding high over the crest of a wave made out of cereal and milk. They had $3.8 billion in revenue, in addition to a 40% share of the US ready-to-eat cereal market. With sales in 150 countries, it was a force to be reckoned with. The great cereal giant turned its attention to India, where it hoped to conquer the breakfast market and take another source of revenue. After all, India was home to at least 950 million new possible consumers. What was to stop them picking a box of cereal off of the shelf instead of whatever they usually bought? Even if Kelloggs managed to conquer just 2% of the market, the enormous population would mean that the profit would be greater than that gained by the 40% market share in the US.

This article is dedicated to those people that are looking for a place where they can plant their own figurative money tree and watch it grow. It is for those who are looking for a place to invest their valuable money and see results of their investment, so that it is not lost. A good business is not defined by the amount of money that is invested at the beginning. It is actually defined by the exactitude with which the place, time and business was chosen. You could invest billions of dollars in an inefficient business and see no profit at all. However, you could invest just a few hundred dollars in a well thought business and see your investment being multiplied over and over again. So it is clear, it is not about how much you invest. It is about when, where and how you invest it.

Take a good time to analyse your market. If you are planning to open a local business in your town, analyze what group of people are going to be your target market. Make sure there are enough people from that group near the locality of your future business. If there are not, look for another place or for another group.

The dawn of 2012 has brought with it several economic and financial debates. However, none of them have grown to be as significant as the European crisis. Many experts have been giving their opinions on the eventual outcome – whether countries will fall or become victors of their own state. Some experts are assuming that, just like the American crisis of 2008, the European crisis will be overcome. On the other hand, others have credited the central federal budget of the Americans for their ability to overcome their crisis. What does this mean for the euro zone? Will the lack of a central government be the major undoing?

The European crisis has mainly been fuelled by the debt crisis that is facing Europe. This can be attributed to the difference in the financial capabilities of the Euro Zone countries. Some of these countries are far more developed and have financial independence than the rest, for example, compare Germany to Greece. The differences resulted in the Euro Zone members relying on debt to fund the projects that were being pioneered by organisation. This led to rampant borrowing from the banks by several countries in the Euro Zone.

However, other experts also attribute the debt to the increasing social expenses of the European countries especially, due to an increase in the aged population, their pension funds. These countries now have to decide who to deal with this increasing problem.

If the aforementioned factors are some of the causes of the euro crisis then the solution is not impossible. One idea is that the euro zone countries need to reduce their over-reliance on debt. First, they need to reduce their social expenses and experts believe that this can be done by increasing their retirement age. Statistics from the UN show that around 20 per cent of Europeans are over the current retirement age of 60.