The goods that were carried along the trading routes of Central Asia shaped fashions in food and clothing all over Asia and Europe.  Metal and clay were two important materials to be traded, as were textiles and all kinds and carpets, which were highly valued in both east and west. Exotic foods and flavours were particularly precious commodities, bringing new tastes such as pepper to the west. 

The routes that stretched between the Far East and Europe transported more than simply merchandise to trade. The tax from merchants funded the development of civilizations all along the length of the routes, and the intellectual and cultural exchanges that took place were vital to the emergence of vibrant, independent, yet interconnected cultures across modern Central Asia. 

The underwater archaeological sites in the Gulf of Siam have revealed a wealth of ships and artefacts, all related to the intense trading activities that went on between China and the Near East and Europe, passing though modern Thailand. The peninsula formed a shortcut for trading vessels, some of whom were importing ceramics, silks and satin from China to the west, and others who were carrying timber products, leather and lead to other Southern Asian countries.

Until the early twentieth century, the Central Asian economy was overwhelmingly rural, and thus agrarian trade was by far the most important trading activity. The impact of technological advances consequently had a profound effect on the social infrastructure of these areas and on the goods manufactured and traded across the Central Asian macro-region.

The geography of Central Asia has largely determined the production and trade of the macro-region.  Pastoral and settled communities produced very different goods to nomadic steppe communities, both in terms of agriculture and farming, and in terms of handicrafts and artefacts, and this has shaped the patterns of trade across these regions.

The survival of coins is the most direct means of access for the historian to the monetary systems of Central Asia in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. In northern parts of Central Asia, there were frequent monetary reforms under the Shaybanid and Janid dynasties. The minting of coins was also a powerful political symbol, as seen in the Kokand and Khiva khanates, the Bukhara emirate, and in Safavid Persia.

Knowledge of the food and clothing of medieval Central Asia is difficult to attain; it is only through sporadic mention in sources that we can accumulate a picture of the diet and dress of the people who lived in these regions.  Variations in climate, region, wealth and class all had a large effect on the daily lives and habits of the inhabitants of Central Asia, resulting in changing customs throughout Iran, Mongolia and Western China.

The Kushan Age (the first to the fourth century AD) was a time of great innovation for the economy of Central Asia. Developments were made in irrigation, crop-raising and breeding, building and handicrafts. Trade and commerce also flourished, and the Silk Routes became an increasingly important part of economic and cultural life, whilst coinage from this time serves as an indication of the political structure of the Kushan Empire.