Question

Technological effects on resources: Define technology. How does it affect resource prices? For example, use the different grades of farmland above and be able to explain and show graphically how improvements in water irrigation, cheaper fertilizer and more productive labor can shift the supply curve bring wheat prices down and reduce scarcity rents.

Answer 1

1. Technology is the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes. It refers to machinery and devices developed

2. Technological advances are changing the way resources are consumed and produced. Technological innovation including the adoption of robotics, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things technology, and data analytics—along with macroeconomic trends and changing consumer behavior are transforming the way resources are consumed and produced.

3. On the side of demand, energy consumption is becoming less intense and more efficient as people use less energy to live their lives and as energy-efficient technologies become more integrated in homes, businesses, and transportation. Also, technological advances are helping to bring down the cost of renewable energies, such as solar and wind energy, handing them a greater role in the global economy’s energy mix, with significant effects for both producers and consumers of fossil fuels.

4. On the side of supply, resource producers are increasingly able to deploy a range of technologies in their operations, putting mines and wells that were once inaccessible within reach, raising the efficiency of extraction techniques, shifting to predictive maintenance, and using sophisticated data analysis to identify, extract, and manage resources.

5. The use of efficient irrigation technology improves crop yields and quality through direct impacts as well as indirect ones, such as decreased soil salinity, fewer attacks from pests and diseases, and less weed competition.

6. As the technology comes together, scientists can investigate how to transition the biofertilizer technology from the development phase to actual farms.

7. Most of the increases in human living standards have come not from working more hours, and not from using more capital or other resources, but from improved productivity—that is, increases in the efficiency of production as defined by the ratio of output to input. In turn, productivity growth comes from new technologies and new techniques of production and distribution.