Ecological deficit

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As ecological deficit ( English ecological debt ) is defined as the extent of the consumption of natural resources by a group of consumers (including the absorption of the state coming from these resources wastes by nature) is exceeded locally sustainable supply of such natural resources as well as when exceeding the Assimilierfähigkeit of Stresses to which nature is exposed. A fixed observation period is used as a basis for recording resource use.

The ecological deficit is the subject of calculations that are undertaken in connection with holistic resource accounting and, among other things, serve to empirically support considerations about sustainability and to back them up with figures.

Considerations in the national framework

The ecological deficit of a country results from the comparison of the national ecological footprint and the nationally available biocapacity , namely when the consumption and production methods exceed the natural capital . The occurrence of an ecological deficit indicates that the inhabitants of a country are using up the natural resources of that country more quickly than the sub-ecosystems of that country are able to generate these resources again. The ecological deficit is therefore an indicator of a lack of sustainability .

There are two ways a country can run into an environmental deficit:

criticism

The calculation of a country's ecological deficit is problematic because countries with high biocapacity and low population density (e.g. Canada ) can show a better balance sheet than countries with low biocapacity and high population density (e.g. Bangladesh ) despite significantly higher resource consumption. .

Considerations that go beyond the national framework

Global resource balances, each viewed for a period of one year

The North American environmental organization Global Footprint Network carries out calculations in this regard, in which the use of natural resources by all countries in the world is balanced for a period of one year. The day on which the global natural resources of a year are used up without leaving any overexploitation on the partial ecosystems of the earth has accordingly shifted forward steadily in recent years. While the time had come in 1993 on October 21 of the same year, the day in 2003 was September 22, in 2013 August 20 and 2014 August 19 in the respective year. In this imaginary model of thought, the remaining time of the year is representative of the extent of the "overexploitation" of the earth's natural resources . Said day is called Earth Overshoot Day or Ecological Debt Day ("World Exhaustion Day", "Green Debt Day " or "Earth Overload Day"). Viewed over the long term, according to these calculations, the world population used only two thirds of the annual natural resources in 1961. The relationship was then reversed in the 1970s because of economic development and population growth .

Ecological overshoot

The ecological overshoot describes an ecological overload on a global scale, which results from the fact that more natural resources are consumed on earth than could be renewed in a reasonable time. In 2008 the ecological overshoot had already reached a deficit of around 50%. This means that it would take 1.5 years to regenerate the resources of the biosphere that were used up in 2007. It can therefore be said that mankind uses the capacity of 1.5 earths annually, although only one earth is available. This consumer behavior works for a limited time, as humans can switch to alternative resources based on overexploitation of nature. But this leads to irreversible exhaustion even faster.

Furthermore, the emitted CO 2 cannot be absorbed in the time it actually needs. Consequences for our environment: global warming , acidification of the seas . This in turn affects the ecosystems that provide biological resources and on which humanity is dependent.

Limits of definition

Some activities such as water use or consumption of minerals and ores are not included in the calculations. In addition to formulated for the national framework "national footprint accounts" ( National Footprint Accounts ) there are models, so-called input-output, capture and further indirect resource requirements.

The opposite of the ecological deficit is referred to in the specialist literature as ecological credit or ecological reserve.

The institution of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) demands that such kind of resource balancing be included in economic calculations in order to influence the rating of each state accordingly.

literature

  • M. Wackernagel, C. Monfreda, D. Moran, P. Wermer, S. Goldfinger, D. Deumling, M. Murray: National footprint and biocapacity accounts 2005: the underlying calculation method. Global Footprint Network. Oakland, Canada, 2005.
  • Umweltbundesamt (Ed.): Scientific investigation and evaluation of the indicator “ecological footprint”. Research report 363 01 135. UBA-FB 001089. ISSN  1862-4804 .
  • Andrew Simms: Ecological debt: the health of the planet and the wealth of nations. Pluto books, London 2005, ISBN 0-7453-2405-3 .
  • U. Thara Srinivasan et al .: The debt of nations and the distribution of ecological impacts from human activities . In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) ISSN  0027-8424 , ISSN  1091-6490 Vol. 105, 2008, H. 5, pp. 1768-1773.
  • J. Timmons Roberts, Bradley C. Parks: Ecologically unequal exchange, ecological debt, and climate justice: the history and implications of three related ideas for a new social movement. In: International Journal of Comparative Sociology ISSN  0020-7152 Vol. 50, 2009, H. 3-4, pp. 381-408.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Markus C. Schulte von Drach: Environmental balance sheet: One earth is not enough. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung online, May 19, 2010.
  2. ↑ a b NGO: Natural resources already used up for 2014: The world population is now living on credit for natural resources for this year. ( Memento from January 13, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Stern Magazin online, August 19, 2014
  3. ↑ WWF Living Planet Report 2012 (PDF), p. 40.
  4. ↑ Ecological deficit as a rating factor , contribution from 1 November 2011 in Germany Kultur

Remarks

  1. ↑ This definition is borrowed from the English-language Wikipedia counterpart to this article, which is headed Ecological debt . The term has been demonstrably in use since 1992; see: ML Robleto, W. Marcelo: Deuda ecológica. Instituto de Ecológia Politica, Santiago de Chile, 1992 (Spanish).