Posted on 11/28/2007 1:32:33 PM PST by Brilliant
The growing economic strength of the European Union has doubled the ecological pressure on the planet in the past 30 years, according to a WWF report.
Despite technological advances, environmental pressure has been growing at a faster rate than the European population, creating a deficit of natural resources for the rest of the world and for future generations.
“Just a generation ago much of Europe was an ecological creditor, using fewer resources than it had,” said Tony Long, Director of WWF’s European Policy Office.
“But today Europe lives beyond its means. If the world’s citizens lived as Europeans, we would need 2.6 planets to provide the necessary resources and absorb the waste.”
In the report, Europe 2007 - Gross Domestic Product and Ecological Footprint, WWF has compared the performance of EU countries in three key areas since 1971: economic growth measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP), pressure on natural resources measured by Ecological Footprint, and human development measured by the UN’s Human Development Index.
“What we currently measure as development is a long way away from the EU and world’s stated aim of sustainable development," said WWF International President Chief Emeka Anyaoku. "This is because economic decisions routinely ignore natural capital expenditure.”
“Economic indicators are essential, but without natural resource accounting, ecological deficits will go unnoticed and ignored," he added. "It is as if we spent our money without realizing that we are liquidating the planet’s capital.”
Ecological deficit
All but three EU Members — Finland, Latvia and Sweden — run an ecological deficit. Though these three countries have greater ecological reserves than others, they do not necessarily manage their assets well. Finland’s pressure on environment, for example, has grown by 70% since 1975 and is now the highest among EU countries.
Germany, together with Bulgaria and Latvia, managed to reduce their ecological footprint in the past three decades while growing in human development. Nevertheless, its footprint is two-and-a-half times its natural resources and remains more than double the world average per person.
On the other hand, Greece and Spain are still expanding in both economic and consumption terms. Greece has experienced the highest growth of ecological footprint, accompanied by a limited growth in terms of human development.
France parallels the general EU trend. With improved technology, its resource availability is increasing but is outpaced by growth of consumption, with the largest component being energy.
Among Eastern European countries, Hungary’s footprint — as other former centrally planned European economies — has fallen since 1991, mainly because of economic shifts resulting from the ending of the Soviet era. Back in 1995, Slovenian citizens were practising, in global terms, sustainable development, but in 2003 Slovenia’s ecological footprint per capita had more than doubled while the development level rose by less than 5%. Romania has the lowest ecological footprint in the EU-27, yet it remains an ecological debtor.
“Countries are increasingly realizing the significance of ecological assets for economic competitiveness, national security and social justice,” said Tony Long.
“Development has to be redefined. Improving the quality of life for hundreds of millions of people will have to be separated from ever growing material consumption and waste.”
What is the ecological footprint?
The Ecological Footprint measures humanity’s demand on the biosphere in terms of the area of biologically productive land and sea required to provide the resources we use and to absorb our waste. The footprint of a country includes the cropland, grazing land, forest and fishing grounds required to produce the food, fibre and timber it consumes and absorb the waste it emits. Biocapacity is the total supply of productive area. The difference between Ecological Footprint and Biocapacity shows whether countries are ecological creditors or debtors.
The EU is home to 7.7% of the global population and 9.5% of the world’s biocapacity. The EU is also responsible for 16% of the global ecological footprint. Europe’s shares have diminished since 1971, largely as a result of increase in global population.
What comes around, goes around.
“What is the ecological footprint?”
It’s whatever the whackos say it is, and it changes daily.
“WWF report.”
AKA: EnviroWacko report
Humans do not belong on this planet.
No worry. Once Europe is fully Islamic, they won’t give a damn.
I thought the EU was a far more recent development.
The arrogance of man stating that he/she can somehow contemplate all the various interconnected processes that God put in place on this our planet.
Natural resources are being depleted? Where does this crapola come from?
The world will NEVER run out of iron, or any of the alloys made from it. It is one of the most highly recycleable elements around, besides being widely distributed. But if iron becomes too expensive to use, there are any number of likely substitutes, which may be fabricated by using energy to form and convert other substances, leaving iron or any of its derivatives to be used for REALLY highly-specialized purposes.
The same holds true for such resources as petroleum - there are all sorts of substitutes that may be put in place. If it is for energy production or heating purposes, nothing is much more efficient at producing low-cost electricity than a nuclear power plant. Petroleum may even be manufactured out of just about any organic material, no need to wait for Muther Natcher to spend a couple million years converting trapped pockets of decaying organic matter into kerogen.
By reforming organic material under heat and pressure, in the presence of superheated steam in a closed retort, almost any organic material may be converted by Thermal Depolymerization to a good grade of crude oil, WITHOUT the pockets of saline and the sandy grit.
And these are just two examples of the range of ingenuity that human beings can apply to the problem at hand.
~~ AGW™ ping~~
when it comes about EU it´s clear that americans don´t want europe to become a superpower.this is natural. you could say the same about europe. EU will allways cheering when america is about to decline. every one wants to be the top dog. EU and Usa are rivals on global stage. but this does not mean that people are not able to make friends around this globe.states do not have friends. They share common interests or not but it´s on to the people to tell the “other” side “hey we don´t hate you” (our governments may rival)but this has nothing to do with you in personal. the fact is we do respect each other on global stage. maybe we don´t agree but we still have a common mind.
greets from europe
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