ON A CONSISTENT DEFINITION OF INTENSIVE USE OF A RESOURCE

Abstract

It would seem, for the sake of convenience and in the interest of imparting exact information, that the terms used in a discipline should have one and only one meaning. Unfortunately economics terminology is not in such a completely refined state that all terms have unambiguous meanings. In some instances different meanings are attached to the same terms which is a source of confusion. This is especially the case for the term "intensive" use of a resource which frequently has been used to describe the relative abundance of a resource in production. The term has been used inconsistently in two opposing senses when applied to land and labor on the one hand and capital and labor on the other hand. While this may not pose a serious problem for a seasoned scholar who can construe the proper meaning in each context, beginning teachers and students need to be made aware of the inconsistency to avoid confusion and unnecessary debate. The word intensive is commonly used to connote the ratio between productive resources in the production process. When it is used in the context of capital and labor, production is referred as either capital intensive or labor intensive depending on the relative abundance of capital or labor. If capital is the abundant factor relative to labor, the capital to labor ratio is high, and the production is termed as capital intensive. If labor is the abundant resource relative to capital, the labor to capital ratio is high and the production is termed as labor intensive. In the former case capital is regarded as being intensively employed while in the latter situation labor is regarded as being in tensively used . However, when the term intensive is used with respect to land and labor, diametrically opposite meanings compared to the above are being implied by the same word. For instance, in agricultural contexts where land is the scarce input and labor is relatively abundant, the land to labor ratio is low, and the cultivation is termed as land intensive. Here land is regarded as being intensively used. In a situation where the land to labor ratio is high , production is referred as land extensive implying nonintensive use of land. ln line with this usage, the concept of intensity of land use is frequently applied in farm management and land economics. According to this concept the more production there is from an acre of land by the greater application of cooperant faCtors, the higher is the intensity of land use. Clearly the use of the word intensive is not consistent in the two situations related above. In going from production involving capital and labor to a situation involving land and labor, the meanings of the same word are being inverted. It seems that for the sake of having unambiguous terminology the term intensive should be used consistently to convey only one meaning irrespective of the factors involved in production. The choice could be based on the original usage of the word and the extent of its current usage in the modern literature. A review of literature reveals that originally the term in-