Jamestown was a a near failure for many reasons.Of these production was a direct cause.
Production depends on three factors: land, labor, and capital. In essence, the London company stole a good bit of land from the Native American Indians-more than enough acreage to have sustained the original hundred colonists. What the London Company had in mind for the colonist to produce on the land they acquired were three primary
commodities: gold, grapes, and sugar. A modern company would have ascertained that these commodities could be produced in any facility it created or land it selected. But the London Company made no such analysis. The result was that the colony was not realistically equipped for the area in which it was established. There was no gold in the
whole of Virginia or anywhere within a thousand miles of it. And the climate was wrong for both grapes and sugar as crops. Another major drawback under the category "land" was the site of the colony itself. …
