ABSTRACT
This chapter expresses that natural resources cannot be defined in physical terms, nor can scarcity be regarded as a problem in any narrowly physical sense. It is now largely accepted that in the foreseeable future economic development will not be brought to a catastrophic halt as it hits the stock resource availability barrier. Nor does it appear likely that market imperfections, geopolitical problems or environmental controls will create any really significant mineral scarcity problems for the now advanced nations. The economic system, with its imperative of continued consumption and production, does not contain mechanisms which can ensure an equitable distribution of resource goods and services, or prevent the scarcity of common property resource flows. Government intervention is then necessary to ensure that resource exploitation and consumption processes can meet the social, material and environmental demands placed upon them.
