Changing value at Higher Level: The same statement as SL, with different real cases: cork, which lost value to screw caps and won it back, and uranium after Fukushima. At HL, link value to economics and politics: prices, taxes, treaties and energy security.
Practise this as you read
- Explain a rise and a fall in the value of one named resource.
- Read a price graph and link each change to a reason.
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Value is not fixed: The value of natural capital is dynamic: a resource that was precious can become almost worthless, and one nobody wanted can become valuable.
Why value changes
- Technology: a new use raises value (lithium in batteries); a substitute lowers it (kerosene for whale oil).
- Economics: demand, price, the cost of extraction, and gluts of supply all move value.
- Culture and society: changing attitudes, e.g. animal rights made real fur less wanted.
- Politics: laws, taxes, treaties and energy security push value up or down.
- Environment: new knowledge of harm (climate change) or of benefits (biodiversity) changes value.
- Scarcity: as a resource runs out, extraction costs more and its value changes.
- Place: value also varies between regions, e.g. cork matters most where wine is made.
Remember it as: Tools, money, minds, laws, nature, scarcity and place: seven reasons value moves.
Value goes up when
- A new use is found
- Demand or energy security grows
- Awareness favours it (renewables)
Value goes down when
- A cheaper substitute appears
- Attitudes or laws turn against it
- Its harm becomes clear
Real example: natural cork is valued most in wine regions such as Portugal and France, where it seals bottles, and far less where wine is not made: value varies by place as well as time.
Show the change: Saying a resource has high value is not enough. Say what changed, why, and whether its value rose or fell.
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The guide asks for two named examples of change over time. Learn each one as a short story: what it was used for, what changed, and why.
Bark
- Cork is the bark of the cork oak; it is stripped by hand every nine years without felling the tree. Portugal produces about half of the world's cork
1990s
- Plastic stoppers and screw caps took over many wine bottles, partly because some cork spoiled the wine: value fell
Fix
- Cork makers found ways to stop the spoiling, and cork found new uses in flooring, insulation and shoes: technology
Today
- Cork is valued as natural and recyclable, and its oak forests as habitat for the rare Iberian lynx: value rose again
Real example: cork's value fell when cheap substitutes arrived, then rose again with new uses and a greener image.
Different reasons, different marks: Four marks need four different reasons. One example can give more than one reason, as long as each reason is a different kind.
A second example, this time with a graph. Uranium shows politics and attitudes changing value.
Why uranium's value changed
- Down: after the Fukushima accident in March 2011, fear of nuclear power grew.
- Down: Japan shut its reactors and Germany decided to close all its nuclear plants.
- Up: nuclear power emits almost no carbon dioxide, so climate goals raised demand.
- Up: at COP28 in 2023, over 20 countries pledged to triple nuclear power by 2050.
Real example: uranium fell from about US$62 a pound at the end of 2010 to about US$20 in 2016, then rose to about US$91 by the end of 2023. Germany closed its last three reactors in April 2023.
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How this comes up: Paper 2, Section B (a): four different reasons, [1] each, each with an example.
The price of uranium fell by about two-thirds between 2010 and 2016, then more than quadrupled by the end of 2023.
Outline four reasons why the value of natural capital such as uranium changes over time.
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