You are welcome to join the APF #futrchat Thursday 16 June 2011 4:00-5:00pm ET and voice your views about the Future of Limited Resources.
Jennifer Jarratt and Cindy Frewen will co-host the Future of Limited Resources, asking formal questions and follow ups. Please ask questions that come to you, add links (if they pertain and are not promotional ads), and teach, inform, persuade, enlighten, or provoke us. See Profuturists Posterous for entire post.
What are limited resources?
The economic definition for limited resource is:
Finite quantities of labor, capital, land, and entrepreneurship available to an economy for the production of goods and services. This is one half of the fundamental problem of scarcity that has plagued humanity since the beginning of time. The other half of the scarcity problem is unlimited wants and needs.
Others point to three types: renewable resources like solar and wind, non-renewable like fossil fuels, water, and REM’s, and then finite resources such as natural species with shorter maturation cycles which can be depleted, become extinct, or be managed, such as forests, fish, and land. Furthermore, pollution may ruin without destroying a resource. The variables complicate analysis and solutions. Not to mention, environmental issues such as global warming and natural resource protection are deeply split along political boundaries.
What else should we consider? Does one variable affect another?
Beyond limited resources?
The Malthusian perspective says population growth is the primary variable and therefore, population control should be a global issue. Others say it’s the eco-footprint of and over-use of limited resources in the developed world that is squelching opportunities for the emerging economies. Still others are limit deniers; we will always find a way.
Among futurists and sustainability experts, many assume that we must consider life beyond continual growth. What is a life of equilibrium like? Does a global distribution of resources work? How do we move towards quality and balanced, away from a model of more and bigger. Are we beyond a scarcity mindset and into an abundance frame or vice versa?
Do limited resources mean an inevitable collapse for some? Many would say they already are experiencing collapse. Does it mean war and conflicts? Again, these are happening over oil and water right now. How will we view resources in 2020, 2040, or 2050? More competively or cooperatively?
Join us to ponder these questions at the futrchat on Twitter. See Profuturists Posterous for additional information.
images fossil fuels population forecast
