According to research conducted by Vaclav Smil, a professor at the University of Manitoba in Canada, the amount of material that is required to produce one personal computer has declined by 68pc over 30 years. However, due to efficiency gains and the fact that technology has become much more affordable in recent decades, the amount of resources that are extracted to produce technology has skyrocketed, since many more people around the world are able to acquire computers.

(Source: Harvard Business Review)

Published in Dawn, Business & Finance weekly, May 23rd, 2016