Malthusian view & Boserupian view

Malthusian View:

• Population would increase geometrically (1,2,4,8,16...)
• Food production would increase arithmatically (1,2,3,4,5...)
• This would mean that the food resources would be too small to provide for the population - 'population vs. food crisis'
• However, this could be solved by either positive checks (war, famine, starvation) or preventative checks (people marrying later and having fewer offspring); which would solve the balance.

Boserupian View:

• As the population increases, there must be new ways of producing food - 'necessity is the mother of invention'
• As she wrote this in the 1960s, the new technology optimsim of the time is presented in her view; GM (genetically modifification) fertilisers, irrigation , tractors…