Key Resources Throughout History?

[JohnRM]

Timeline-wise, what were they?

Clearly oil is the most important resource now, with water coming up fast behind it.

Before that we have coal, prior to the 1940s, I think.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

It seems that with "importance" you refer to how powerful a resource makes you? For instance water is obviously more important than oil to humans in general terms but the relative abundance of water and scarcity of oil makes oil a more powerful asset.

 

[sophie]

I resent your remark. Tulips was a legitimate answer considering it caused a real commodity bubble.

 

[Dachs]

This thread is just as meaningless as the other one. How can one judge between oil and, say, rice, or cereals? What kind of quantitative measures of importance are you even looking for? And why the 1940s?

How does the OP of this thread lend itself any more to a real discussion of, well, anything other than mindlessly naming things that could be construed as "resources", than the other thread was?

 

[innonimatu]

The thread makes sense, it's just that the original question is very open to interpretation. Oil in the 1940s was indeed a critical resource, no one was going to win WW2 without oil, even with lost of coal and a Fischer–Tropsch process.
The conversion from oil to coal as the main source for electrical power, that as actually in the 50s. But the strategic value of oil came up with aviation and mechanized warfare.

Coal was also strategic before oil and not just as a fuel for navies since the mid 19th century. Without coal you just couldn't develop a decent industrial base. Even if you had something to trade against it you wouldn't be buying coal for industrial use, you'd buy it for running stuff like trains. Industrial products, especially cast iron and steel, you'd buy finished. Meaning that those countries with sizeable coal reserves had the vast majority of the tremendously important (strategically and economically) steel industry. Meaning they'd have a supply chain advantage in producing everything based on iron, which meant almost every major industry (machines, shipbuilding, railroad material, cars) but that of clothing.

Food was always strategic but food was always produced everywhere you had water, soil, and people. It wasn't such a limiting factor as oil and cola came to be during their respective ages.

Before coal? I guess that precious metals were the limited resource with the most strategic impact. Gold and silver were the basis of commerce, and they ruled as strategic resources for some 2500 years in some places.

Tin was also very important in antiquity as we all know (bronze age and all that). Copper was somewhat scarce so I guess it could also be called a key resource. Not so with iron, it was everywhere in quantities capable of supporting small scale use, and by the time of the industrial revolution there was already an international trade in iron.

Water as a strategic resource? I keep hearing that but I don't believe, for the reason stated by SiLL.

 

[Dachs]

The thread makes sense, it's just that the original question is very open to interpretation.

It only makes sense if you're predisposed to interpreting the question in a way that fits with your own understanding of and inclination towards discussion stuff that used to happen back in the day in terms of "key" resources that were ostensibly required to make certain things that you believe to have been important work and happen.

 

[Old Hippy]

opium and tea and marmalade...


were key resources enabling the growth of the mighty British empire...

more pointedly "Dundee Marmalade", by Keiller & Sons, was one of the first internationally branded trade products when it was produced off shore to avoid a British sugar tax and was traded through out the mighty British empire...
this contributed to the valuable slave trade to produce sugar and the opium and tea trade in china and honkers, as what stiff upper lip Englishman will not have marmalade on their toast, this enabled them to steal the secret of tea from the Chinese, to then grow in India,

so marmalade is the key resource of the 1780- 2013 period of world economic growth, the current downturn can be directly linked to the use of marmalade declining

 

[Mouthwash]

Timeline-wise, what were they?

Clearly oil is the most important resource now, with water coming up fast behind it.

Before that we have coal, prior to the 1940s, I think.

Copper. Without copper you don't have civilization.

/endthread

 

[sophie]

Copper. Without copper you don't have civilization.

/endthread

Copper wouldn't have done a lick of good without tin. And tin was significantly rarer than copper.

 

[Zelig]

Women have been an important resource throughout history.

 

[sophie]

Women have been an important resource throughout history.

 

[Silurian]

Coal was also strategic before oil and not just as a fuel for navies since the mid 19th century. Without coal you just couldn't develop a decent industrial base. Even if you had something to trade against it you wouldn't be buying coal for industrial use, you'd buy it for running stuff like trains. Industrial products, especially cast iron and steel, you'd buy finished. Meaning that those countries with sizeable coal reserves had the vast majority of the tremendously important (strategically and economically) steel industry. Meaning they'd have a supply chain advantage in producing everything based on iron, which meant almost every major industry (machines, shipbuilding, railroad material, cars) but that of clothing.

The other problem with cheaper coals is that they are not so easy to transport and store due to the problem of exothermic reactions leading to fires.

 

[Dachs]

Oh. My. God. You're awesome.

 

[LamaGT]

My answer in the previous thread was semi-serious too. Spices were important in its own way (certainly not as Spore depicts them though ), the demand for spices and other exotic goods fueled the age of exploration, which did change the world in quite a few ways.

Other than that I'd say gold/silver, steel and food. The first is obvious, steel was and is used in everything starting from the middle ages and food supply was definitely very important for conducting military operations (though of course the supply consisted of pillaging for most of the history of warfare, but still).

 

[Ailedhoo]

Food naturally.

 

[dutchfire]

Energy

 

[classical_hero]

There are far too many to state. In what manner are you talking about importance?

BTW, such a short Chamber OP is not good.

 

[potatokiosk]

Humans. No humans, no civilization.

 

[kiwitt]

Salt in its day was a key resource.

 

[Masada]

Black people.