Footprint Network Blog
With the richest biodiversity in the world per hectare, Ecuador has abundant natural capital. But in the last 50 years, it’s ecological surplus has dwindled to almost zero. Its Ecological Footprint currently is almost equal to its biocapacity, the amount of resources the land and sea area within its borders is able to produce.
Dania Quirola Suarez, Advisor to the National Secretary of Planning and Development of Ecuador, told attendees of an important step Ecuador has taken to address its ecological balance sheet. It has included the metric in its National Development Plan, setting a target to reduce the nation’s Footprint to a level at or below biocapacity by 2013.
In keeping with that commitment, Ecuador has launched a plan to keep 846 million barrels of oil under the Amazon rainforest permanently in the ground, Suarez told attendees. The plan would keep 407 metric tones of CO2 out of the atmosphere, and preserve one million acres of forest preserved. It also preserves the livelihood of those belonging to the indigenous cultures from the region. “In this way, we can move from an extractive economy to sustainable development, that includes broader use of energy sources and increasing social equity,” Suarez said.
(Download Quirola’s Presentation)
Learn more about Ecuador’s Ecological Footprint Initiative
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The United Arab Emirates is one of the countries with the largest deficits between “income” in the form of biocapacity and “expenses” of resources, Razan Al Mubarak, Director, Emirates Wildlife Society, told attendees. In 2007, the country adopted a national Ecological Footprint Initiative to address that gap.
In the latter 20th century, the UAE enjoyed explosive economic growth, largely due to the production of oil and gas, and that wealth has helped support some of the largest per-capita resource consumption in the world. On the other hand, the country has very low biocapacity, and must import most of its resources from abroad. When UAE leaders learned the country topped the world in per-capita Ecological Footprint, they were at first skeptical of the data, Mubarak said. But with support from local NGOs advancing the Footprint Initiative, “there became increasing understanding of and support for the data. From there, there became fantastic momentum toward, ‘what are we going to do about it?’
“The more you get into the Footprint, the more doors and avenues open,” Mubarak said. “There are 6,000 data points that go into this indicator. How do we take this momentum and try to really advance it on a policy level? In my country, water and electricity are the key pressure areas. Demand is exceeding supply.” Masdar Institute, a research institute dedicated to green innovation, has gotten behind the initiative. With support from Global Footprint Network researchers, it is looking into how various policy interventions could change the Footprint of the country’s energy sector.
(Download Mubarak’s Presentation)
Learn more about the UAE’s Ecological Footprint Initiative.
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The Mediterranean region has been rocked this year by an economic crisis resulting from over-extension of financial resources. But Greece, Italy and other countries of the Mediterranean face another yawning deficit – an ecological deficit – that poses deep-seeded risks to the region’s long-term success. On the opening day of Footprint Forum, Global Footprint Network announced the launch of its Mediterranean Initiative to address and potentially reverse this trend.
Developed in partnership with WWF’s Mediterranean Programme Office, UNESCO and Plan Bleu, the Initiative is an effort to bring leaders together to develop a regional approach to managing resource-dependence and biocapacity.
The Mediterranean region, rich in history, art, and architecture, is home to many diverse cultures and continues to be an attractive destination for tourists (with more than 25 percent
of global tourism visiting this region). However, it is becoming more and more ecologically fragile as demand for resources continues to increase the pressure on its ecological assets. Currently, all but one country (Montenegro) is using more ecological services than nature can provide within their borders, a situation which is likely to cause local ecological deterioration. But it is not too late to reverse these trends.
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The Mediterranean Initiative, funded by the MAVA Foundation, aims to bring the reality of resource constrains to the center of the Mediterranean policy debate, and to support decision-makers with specific tools that help them weigh policy trade-offs. These tools will enable policy analysts and decision-makers to more fully identify the risks that resource limitations pose to their countries’ economic stability. It should also help them pinpoint the opportunities that lie in aggressive, timely efforts to reduce their overall resource dependence.
In order to manage and govern the Mediterranean region, as well as each of its countries, policymakers must have the ability to monitor ecological limits at both levels. This is a core requirement of the measurement of sustainability, and will help ensure that development efforts succeed by working with, rather than against, nature’s budget.
Learn more about the Mediterranean Initiative.
Download the report Tracking Trends in the Mediterranean Region.
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Among the many benefits of educating girls in Africa is its potential for reducing population pressure, Camfed International Director Ann Cotton said at the Footprint Forum Conference public day. Girls’ education has moved center stage from being viewed as a gender and equality issue to one that is increasingly seen as central to global security and the elimination of poverty, Cotton said. “Every child is born to a mother, and when a child is born to a mother who is not educated, that child is at a disadvantage from the start.”
Educating girls also has a significant impact in reducing family size, an important issue in impoverished regions where access to basic resources can be a challenge. “In Zambia, in all of the schools in which we work, we’ve seen a reduction in pregnancy by 90 percent,” Cotton said.
By funding the relatively minimal costs that it takes for a girl to acquire the school books and uniforms she needs to attend school, Camfed has enabled 400,000 young women to complete an education. Some 14,000 of those young women have gone on to be ambassadors for positive change in their countries and their communities.
“When change is coming from the outside, it is far less likely to be significant,” Cotton told attendees. Girls who would have been resigned to a life of illiteracy and poverty are now influencing at the highest levels, speaking to organizations such as the World Economic Forum and the United Nations.
When Cotton researched the issue of why girls in Africa were not educated as widely as boys, she discovered it wasn’t because of cultural attitudes, but because of poverty. “The opportunities are clearly profound, if we are not talking about attitudinal change, which is very difficult, but about the material costs of sending girls to school.” Camfed’s work is an example of how seizing on the right opportunities can enable widespread transformation, said Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel.
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Feeding the 9 billion people projected by mid-century is possible, but doing so will require major economic and political changes, Juan Gonzales-Valero of agri-business leader Syngenta said on the second day at the conference. Gonzales-Valero presented the findings of Vision 2050, an effort by the World Business Council of Sustainable Development, representing 29 of the world’s most influential companies, to develop pathways to a one-planet economy by 2050.
Sustainably providing for 9 billion people would require halving CO2 emissions, doubling agricultural output, and providing for a four- to tenfold increase in resource efficiency. “We believe it is possible. It is not a Utopian vision,” Gonzalez-Valero said. “Most of the necessary technologies are already in place. It’s about how they can be applied and shared.”
But reaching these goals will require radical transformations to existing government and market structures, including a rethinking of the way things are valued to better reflect their external cost and value. He called on governments and business to work together in the transition. Only companies that can build sustainable thinking into their strategy for the future will be able to be successful in the rapidly approaching era of resource constraints, he said.
Download Juan Gonzales-Valero’s presentation.
Learn more about Vision 2050.
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The world is headed toward a no-growth economy, but how the transition is managed will make the difference between whether that correction is drastic or benign. This warning came from economist Hannes Kunzon tat a plenary discussion on rethinking growth. “We don’t have to rethink growth,” Kunz said. “Growth is going to go away.”
Download Hannes Kunz’ presentation.
“The financial claims on the world economy – such as debt obligations, pension expectations, stocks, investments – can only be paid back by extracting more resources and converting them into financial assets. But we have a finite amount of resources, and those resources are becoming less and less available, so we’re trapped,” he said.
Much as has occurred in financial markets with the bursting of the credit bubble, ecological overspending is about to reach a tipping point with a significant effect on the world economy.
Models done by Kunz’ Institute for Integrated Economic Research show per capita GDP stabilizing at levels anywhere from those of 20 years ago to those of a hundred years ago. “We need to start thinking about how we manage the transition,” he said. “If we don’t do it right, we won’t have a chance to build something good afterward.”
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Countries with healthy ecological balance sheets make for safer investments and will be better able to meet their debt obligations—so says Balacz Magyar, a representative of Swiss-based private banking firm Sarasin Bank. The bank, with 63.2 billion worth of assets under management, has implemented a system of rating country bonds based on sustainability and Ecological Footprint. Countries are required to meet a minimum resource efficiency and availability threshold to be eligible for inclusion in certain portfolios. “We believe that only these countries will be able to pursue the economic activities they will need to pay back their debts in the long-run,” said Balazs Magyar, Head of Sustainable Investment Portfolio Management for Sarasin. High foreign and public debt means conceding future resources to someone else, he said, and the issue is similar for ecological as for economic debt.
Read more about Sarasin’s Sustainability Ratings.
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There is no cheap-oil future for us, and if humanity doesn’t make the transition to a sustainable energy source, Mother Nature will. Robert Rapier, Chief Technology Officer of Merica International, issued this warning during an opening presentation at Footprint Forum aimed at providing a briefing in some of the ways we are hitting ecological limits.
According to Rapier, we are reaching the point at which rising human demand for oil is outpacing our ability to discover new sources of oil. As populations grows and large segments of humanity seek to improve their standard of living, supply will simply not be able to keep up with demand, driving the price of oil up and availability down.
According to Rapier, peak oil—when oil production rates begin an irreversible decline – will have a direct effect on global warming. “When there’s a decline in oil production, the first thing we do is turn to coal plants and tar sands,” he said. “We will demand that because we have built a society on cheap oil. But eventually fossil fuels will run out.” That would address the problem of climate change, he said, but most likely not in the way people would like to see it solved.
Rapier is Chief Technology Officer for Merica International, a bioenergy holding company. He has authored a number of articles on energy and sustainability, including a chapter on renewable diesel for “Biofuels, Solar and Wind as Renewable Energy Systems: Benefits and Risks.” Rapier’s presentation was given during a session titled “Challenges,” during which several speakers laid out key issues exacerbating today’s environmental challenges.
Download Rapier’s presentation.
Read Rapier’s blog, R Squared.
Other speakers included:
Duncan Pollard, Director of the Conservation Practice & Policy Division for WWF International, who spoke of the alarming decline in biodiversity. (Download Pollard’s presentation.)
Martha Campbell, president and CEO of Venture Strategies for Health and Development and instructor at the University of Berkeley, who spoke on challenges in population growth, particularly in low-income countries. (Download Campbell’s presentation.)
Claus Conzelmann, vice president, Head of Safety, Health & Environmental Sustainability for Nestlé, who spoke on the alarming decline in water supply due to climate change, and the rapid increase of water consumption. (Download Conzelmann’s presentation.)
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“Politicians are caught in a dilemma between political suicide and ecological suicide,” Dr. Mathis Wackernagel told the gathering of 200 scientists, economists, and government and business leaders during Footprint Forum’s opening plenary session. What most policy-makers have failed to realize is that those countries that can maintain a positive ecological balance will have a large advantage in a world facing climate change and ecological limits, he said. United Nations Environment Programme representative Haroldo Mattos de Lemos put it another way: “Businesses plan for next decade. Governments plan for the next election.”
(Download Presentations from Opening Plenary)
But some countries are already taking action to address their ecological balance sheet, and attendees heard from two such countries: the UAE which has very low biocapacity and yet has the highest per capita Ecological Footprint in the world, and Ecuador, which has an extremely rich biocapacity that it wants to maintain.
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Swiss-based Bank Sarasin has developed a new country bond rating that could shift the way investors think about sovereign bonds – and the way governments think about their own ecological balance sheets. The evaluation is based upon a simple, but somewhat novel premise: given current ecological trends, a country’s use and availability of resources will play an important role in its ability to make good on future debt obligations.
Sarasin has developed a Sustainability Matrix for Countries, which evaluates countries based on the factors of resource efficiency and resource availability. Sovereign bonds of countries that meet a certain threshold for sustainability – including Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Costa Rica, Chile, Brazil and Australia – are good candidates for investment. Meanwhile, those that do not meet these criteria, such as the U.S., China, Russia, most countries of Southern Europe and most oil-rich countries of the Middle East, cannot be included in Sarasin sustainability portfolios, no matter how good their performance on other indicators.
“With ecological scarcity increasing every day, there is a risk to countries that waste resources as well as to countries that don’t have a lot of resources,” said Bank Sarasin sustainability analyst Balazs Magyar. “By providing this assessment, we can increase the bonds’ performance, or at least decrease the risk.”
The matrix was released just weeks before a downgrade in Greece’s bond ratings sent the country reeling into economic chaos. Sarasin’s sustainability ratings had also given Greece poor marks, due to the fact that, in the last several decades, Greece has developed a widening ecological debt. Greece’s per person Ecological Footprint has grown fivefold since 1960. At the same time, its biocapacity has remained effectively constant.
“As is abundantly clear from climate change, biodiversity loss, and the myriad other environmental crises we are facing today, we are now in an ever-more ecologically-constrained world,” said Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel. “Resource-scarcity is emerging as a growing risk factor to countries’ abilities not only to meet their debt obligations, but to secure quality of life for their citizens.”
Learn more about the Sustainability Matrix
Sweden tops systematic country rating
Adequate resources must be available for a national economy to grow, but in global terms a steady level of sustainable development can only be maintained in the long term by improving resource-efficiency. Two groups of countries perform well according to Bank Sarasin’s Sustainability Matrix: those rich in resources such as Australia and Brazil, and those that use resources in a very efficient way. The latter group includes countries such as Japan, the Netherlands, Germany and also Switzerland. Sweden actually does well by both measures.
Latin America is high in resource availability, but currently lags in efficiency. Yet the region could have tremendous opportunity if it improved its resource efficiency. At the same time, Japan, Germany and the Netherlands are very efficient, but don’t have significant availability. “Their level of efficiency shows that they could manage future challenges, but for current time, they are over-consuming their resources,” Magyar said.
U.S., Gulf States rate poorly
The U.S. misses the benchmark because, in spite of its sound resource availability, it provides the same quality of life as other industrialized countries on significantly more resources. “The U.S. has a lot of biocapacity but, because of its high rate of resource demand, its Ecological Footprint actually exceeds biocapacity by almost 50 percent,” said Dr. Wackernagel. “When demand is way out of sync with biocapacity, you are in a risky situation. Eventually, it will catch up to you.”
UAE, Cyprus and Qatar rate as the least efficient countries in their income group. As desert countries, they have almost no ecological capacity and, at the same time, they have very inefficient use of resources. “Once the oil runs out, the party might be over,” said Magyar. On the other hand, he said, the region might have a very promising future in emerging solar technology. “No rain, means no clouds, which means a possibility of getting power from the sun.”
Download Bank Sarasin’s sustainability ratings report
Download Bank Sarasin’s Sustainability Report 2009, featuring an interview with Mathis Wackernagel
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