Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.06.2007, Qupperneq 6

10_RVK_GV_07_007_ARTICLE/ENVIRONMENT
You’d need to have pretty big feet to walk in our shoes.
Our footprint is 25% bigger than the whole planet.
However: it may be big, but it’s not clever.
The footprint in question is a metaphorical one: it
is our ecological footprint. The tally of the renewable
resources humanity takes from the planet against what
the planet can regenerate. We have exceeded the planet’s
annual sustainable bounty by some time in September
each year.
Ecological footprinting is a theoretical science, but
it is measured in the most tangible and physical sense
possible: land area (usually given as gha, or ‘global
hectares’). An ecological footprint analysis can be car-
ried out for individuals, communities, nations and all
of humanity, but also for things like factories, offices
and even clubs and hobby groups. We can all find out
our environmental impact in the form of a tangible gha
number.
Notably, the ecological footprint does not include
our use of non-renewable resources such as fossil fuels,
metals and quarried goods – it is concerned solely with
renewable resources. The Global Footprint Network
sums it up thus: “how much land and water area does
a human population require to produce the resources
it consumes and to absorb its wastes under prevailing
technology?”
1.9 gha per Person
Let’s put this into context. The amount of land needed
to provide food, drink and all other renewable consum-
ables – and to absorb the resultant waste – is 9.5 gha for
every American. That figure is 5.45 for the British, 4 for
the Swiss and just 1.5 for every Chinese person. At the
present population level and with present technology,
the planet can allow each human about 1.9 gha.
With increasing wealth and aspirations, the ecological
footprint of the Chinese is growing rapidly – and so is
the global population. But how are we able to live the
way we do if there aren’t the resources available? After
all, you can’t have what doesn’t exist.
The question is not just one of available resources,
but more about the sustainability of those resources.
We are still lucky enough to have the resources to live
as wastefully as we want, but ecological footprinting
aims to encourage us to leave enough for future gen-
erations. Deforestation, over fishing, species extinction
and carbon-induced climate change are just some of
the issues that underline our lack of sustainability.
Worryingly, the over-exploitation of natural resources
can actually be an exponentially increasing problem – as
taking a tonne of fish from a healthy stock will have
less of an impact and be replaced quicker than taking
a tonne of fish from a depleted stock. Just as there may
not be ‘plenty more fish in the sea’, so too might we
‘not be able to see the trees for the (dead) wood’. The
more we damage our tropical forests, the less able they
are to regenerate.
Simplified Equation
Of course, measuring the impact of all human activity on
all aspects of the natural world is incredibly difficult, if not
impossible. A certain amount of simplification inevitably
happens when turning Mother Nature into a mathemati-
cal equation, and as a result there are critics.
Figures based on crude estimates are often used
and little notice is taken of geographical circumstances
– as a hectare of intensive arable land may be given the
same value whether in Iceland or in the middle of the
Amazon. It is also difficult to account for multiple land
uses, where a forest is considered a carbon sink and not
a source of food and the food production and carbon
absorption of residential areas are not considered.
Also, one person is considered to have a lower impact
as a member of a family household of ten people than
say one of three people. While true on a basic level,
this fails to account for their possible contribution to
over-population.
Does this hair splitting actually matter though? Sup-
porters of ecological footprints think not. They argue
that the figures are accurate enough to show that we
are consuming far too much, far too quickly – and that’s
all that matters.
Calculate Your Own Footprint
It is worth mentioning that ecological footprints are just
one of several footprints available to the environmentally
conscious – or to be forced upon the environmentally
ignorant. For example, ecological footprints take account
of climate change, because of the atmosphere’s status as
a changing system and part of the carbon cycle – with
carbon contributors and carbon sinks. It doesn’t take
account of where the carbon is coming from though.
For that you need a carbon footprint.
The carbon footprint is the amount of carbon emitted
by each person, company, nation or other community
through their use of fossil fuels. It is most commonly
measured in tonnes per year.
You may also hear tell of such notions as bio-pro-
ductivity footprints and biodiversity footprints. These are
more accurate ways of looking at the impact of specific
land usage and our impact upon the natural habitat in
a given ecosystem.
And so ends ‘The Grapevine Lecture Series: Footprints
101’. We hope you find it useful. For more information,
visit www.footprintnetwork.org.
One Giant Step for Mankind
Text by Alex Elliot Photo by Gulli
We are still lucky enough to
have the resources to live as
wastefully as we want, but eco-
logical footprinting aims to en-
courage us to leave enough for
future generations.
GREEN