ABSTRACT
The normal market reaction to increasing scarcity of individual depletable resources, such as oil, is to switch to renewable resources. Resource scarcity can be countered without violating sustainability by finding new sources of conventional materials, as well as discovering new uses for unconventional materials, including what was previously considered waste. Impenetrable proximate physical limits on resource availability are typically less of a problem than the adverse atmospheric and biological consequences of their use. New sustainable forms of development are possible and desirable, but they will not automatically be adopted in either the high-income or the low-income nations. Public policy and sustainable development must proceed in a mutually supportive relationship. Tax subsidies to promote cattle ranching on the fragile soil in the Brazilian rain forest not only stimulated an unsustainable activity, but also imposed irreparable damage on an ecologically significant area.
