While natural resources have played an important role in creating wealth and powering development, recent research shows an inverse correlation between the abundance of natural resources and growth and development. This has been true of many of the economies in Latin America, Africa and the Arab world, regions characterized by high levels of natural resources endowments, be they minerals, oil or timber. The inverse correlation between endowment and wealth creation—dubbed as the natural resource curse hypothesis—has been the subject of intense study and has yielded valuable insights into political economy issues.
Natural resource abundance has been associated with predatory political regimes which win and maintain political support
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This understanding is noticeably sparse. To be fair, developing a good understanding of stakeholder motivations is extremely challenging because of the complex nature of the sector, which itself arises from special sector characteristics. What are these? These range from the biophysical, to the social, to economic, to the state. On the biophysical side, forest resources contribute multiple benefits and services; yet the resource (even though it is technically renewable) renews only quite slowly and many services can be irreversibly lost if the resource stock falls below a critical minimum. On the social front, this is a sector which is characterized by unclear ownership and access rights and conflicts between traditional and “modern” legal rights. The resource generates multiple benefits for multiple users and often these are in conflict. Unlike other resources, forests provide a wide range of public benefits ( watershed protection, carbon sequestration, biodiversity protection, and ecosystem resilience) only when they are preserved; and they provide private benefits (timber rents) principally when they are harvested. So there is a well-recognized need for high levels of intervention to ensure optimal and sustainable levels of harvesting as well as adequate protection of the public benefits. In addition, both,
From the earliest civilizations natural resources have shaped the course of Humanity. Some resources have allowed us to rise up, invent new machines, and build mighty empires. While others have taken hundreds of lives and forced humanity to take a step back on the path of progression.
* The motive of Western based environmental groups. Who’s driving this bus? Is it the competition in the US and Europe from the softwood timber producers?
Similar to the societal explanation, the cognitive explanation for the effects of the resource curse suggests that the wealth from resource abundance causes countries to be riskier with their money. Instead of investing in multiple sectors and foreign bonds, African countries tend to indulge in the wealth and focus solely upon it with no consideration of sustainability or possible busts. Since policymakers become shortsighted, they do not realize that that their economy is falling apart until it is too late.
Natural resources can be found all over America from dirt to diamond all the resources found help build our nation. “The great California gold rush began on January 24, 1848, when James W. Marshall discovered a gold nugget in the American River.”(California
For instance, most of the developments in the developed countries are based on growth, that is, they are depend on natural resources like minerals, gas and oil for their economic development. Moreover, the emerging developing countries such as India, china and brazil need a lot of natural resources to develop. This means that countries which are rich in resources in Latin America have emphasized and focused on the extraction of natural resources for their development and export. Neo extractivisim has been coined to refer to policies and regulations which strengthen states role in the ownership and exploitation of natural resources, a development which has gained great momentum inmost parts of the developing nations (Burchardt, Hans-Jürgen, and Kristina, 2014). Extractivisims is a development model that has political, natural and socioeconomic influences (class structure, interaction between public and state and gender) within a country majorly in countries with abundant resources in the
anada is filled with many natural resources such as fossil fuels, mineral, and lumber. Having so many different types of natural resources helps improve the economy of Canada and living in a country with a high economy means you will have better public services since the government will have a lot of tax money. With better public services you will have better schools and health care.Canada has one of the best health care system and the better the health care system the longer you will live and it will improve the quality of life since you can easily treat diseases. Canada's natural resources place a big role on Canada's economy. Around 20% of the money made by natural resources directly and indirectly account for Canada's GDP. The natural resource
In the reading named "The Forest Stewardship Council: Risk and Potential of Private Forest Governance" written by Philipp H. Pattberg explains the negative and positive elements of privately managing of forests. As we all know forests and natural resources always recognized as a common property, especially in urban and industrialized cities.
This paper uses the terms natural resource(s), resource(s), and reserve(s) in many different contexts. Please use care when interpreting their usage and context.
Clearly, it states that it is aircraft and motor parts, as a result of half of the Bahamas' economy depends on tourism. Medicines would likewise be a must have for ailing or wounded tourists. Telecommunications would be a cordial souvenir for tourists, and the Bahamas would make a pleasant penny for that.
Like any other public organization, diverse interest groups try to influence the Forest Service. In order to improve the way the Forest Service (Forestry) prioritizes who makes what kind of input to their leadership, and how different stakeholder groups communicate with one another and with local Forest Service, offices present an opportunity to improve the organization at the local and institutional level.
The ambition of the often autocratic leaders to acquire more land, which may bring them access to oil, water or arable land. The problem according to Sørli et. al is “scarcity” and “abundance” (147). Water is scarce, and oil is in abundance, but the access to both is limited. According to our text, the new “water wars” have emerged as a major source of conflict, in addition to the “oil wars” (Anderson et. al, 226). Water is scarce in the Middle East, and will continue to dwindle as the population rises. Not every country has the same access to the water sources, which will naturally cause problems. For example, Israel has control of the Golan, and Egypt of the Nile, and Kuwait of the Persian Gulf. Oil is in abundance, but only to a limited number of countries in the Middle East causing great economic disparity between those who have, and those who do not. Kuwait, having access to the Persian Gulf, produces a large supply of oil to international players. Given its high value internationally, and its worth, oil is much sought after.
In general, when there is a presence of natural resource wealth, autocracies outperform democracies. This results from resource-rich democracies underinvesting their surplus, choosing instead to focus on elections and electoral competition. Autocracies, however, choose to utilize surplus wealth in corrupt ways, which, like a democracy, fails to invest in society. In resource-rich societies, investment “is particularly important since this is how the resource surplus can be transformed into sustained increases in income” (Collier, 2007; Pg. 42). The few resource-rich, developing countries that have managed to avoid the resource curse can contribute their success to the ways in which their political institutions interact with their resource wealth.
Many studies have demonstrated the idea that institutions are the main factor of economic development because empirical evidence points to strong institutions being able to determine large growth of GDP per capita. Although the characteristics of strong institutions can be described as the potential fundamental cause of economic growth, the effects of geography and materials available to different certain regions have a huge hand in properly developing a society economically and allowing for further growth. The resources of the countries heavily depend on the raw materials available to each region and the kinds of animals they are able to domesticate. This is where the argument circulates around in which geography is a large determinant of whether a civilization or society can prosper in a certain area or not.
Development processes is connected with environmental degradation and use of natural resources. Rudel et al. (2011) assumes the present of two distinct waves of development power which control environment. The first wave of political economy deals with the power of capitalism as the main agent for environmental degradation, while the second wave concern with the social power (community) to control the use of natural resources.
Why Nations Fail takes an in depth look into why some countries flourish and become rich powerful nations while other countries are left in or reduced to poverty. Throughout this book review I will discuss major arguments and theories used by the authors and how they directly impact international development, keeping in mind that nations are only as strong as their political and economical systems.