Humanity's Ecological Footprint: The gap between supply and demand

By: emilyaviles

I imagine that tracing humanity’s average Ecological Footprint would be much like tracking Bigfoot’s trail through the forest. Now, where the size of this cryptid’s foot is debatable, the size of humanity’s Ecological Footprint is not. Each year Global Footprint Network calculates the Ecological Footprint of more than 100 nations and humanity as a whole. An Ecological Footprint is basically the calculation of how many resources nature is able to provide, how much is being used, and who uses what.

The results of this year’s report are quite sobering.

According to figures released this week, we humans now require the resources that it would take one and a half planets to sustainably produce. Humanity is demanding nature’s resources and producing carbon dioxide emissions at a rate 47 percent faster than what nature can regenerate and reabsorb. To continue in this analysis, the data reveals that if everyone lived like the average American, it would require five planets to produce the resources we consume and absorb our CO2 emissions. If everyone lived like the average European, we would require the capacity of 2.5 planets. (For a full list of countries, go here.)

Sobering indeed. Yet, hope for change remains!

Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel believes that, “these trends show it is in the self-interest of each government to act now to succeed in a resource-constrained world, no matter what happens on the world stage.” He continues to say that, “even as world leaders have acknowledged that an agreement at Copenhagen is out of reach, governments we work with from Ecuador to the United Arab Emirates are seeing the importance of taking bold individual action.”

My bet is that Bigfoot, wherever he may or may not be, is thankful for organizations like Global Footprint Network that will continue researching and working with government and opinion leaders on every continent to make ecological limits central to policy and decision-making.

Read the full National Footprint Accounts for 2009 here.

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Some moves to stop global warming are devastating to tribal people

By: Toast

Measures to stop global warming risk being as harmful to tribal peoples as climate change itself, according to a new report from tribal rights organization Survival International.

The report, "The most inconvenient truth of all: Climate change and indigenous people," sets out four key "mitigation measures" that threaten tribal people. They are as follows:

1. Biofuels are promoted as an alternative, "green" source of energy to fossil fuels, yet much of the land allocated to grow them is the ancestral land of tribal people. If biofuels expansion continues as planned, millions of indigenous people worldwide stand to lose their land and livelihoods.

2. Hydro-electric power is causing a new boom in dam construction in the name of combating climate change, but is driving thousands of tribal people from their homes.

3. Forest conservation in Kenya’s Ogiek is forcing hunter-gatherers from the forests that they have lived in for hundreds of years to "reverse the ravages" of global warming.

4. Carbon offsetting is giving tribal peoples’ forests a monetary value in the booming "carbon credits" market. Indigenous people say this will lead to forced evictions and the "theft of our land."

The report calls for tribal people to be fully involved in decisions that affect them, and for their land ownership rights to be upheld.

Survival International's Director Stephen Corry said today that, "this report highlights ‘the most inconvenient truth of all’

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