Introduction

This chapter considers the problems of production and technology when natural resources or, more generally, non-produced means of production have a relevant role.

The theory of resources, technologies and production, on the one hand, and that of rent, distribution and prices, on the other, both founded on multisectoral structural schemes, have been a constant line of research for me. Firstly, the role of the relative scarcities due to land, natural resources, primary commodities, crops and raw material is analysed (Quadrio Curzio, 1967). This scheme is subsequently enlarged in various directions, examining also a wider category of non-produced means of production, in uniperiodical, comparative uniperiodical and dynamic contexts (Quadrio Curzio, 1975, 1977, 1986; Quadrio Curzio, Manara and Faliva, 1987; Quadrio Curzio and Pellizzari, 1991). In these analyses the original approaches have been improved through the use of more powerful mathematical tools applied also to the new problems. Some of the most important results have been already published in English (Quadrio Curzio, 1980, 1986; Quadrio Curzio and Pellizzari, 1991). Finally, a more general model on resources, technology and rent has recently been published (Quadrio Curzio and Pellizzari, 1996).

The nature and positioning of my approach within general economic theory has been explained in a survey of mine on ‘land rent’ (Quadrio Curzio, 1987). This category is for me the basis of any kind of rent deriving from ‘technological scarcities’ due to natural resources or to other ‘scarcities’.