People ... Mathis Wackernagel
Idea ... The Ecological Footprint

Mathis Wackernagel: The Ecological Footprint

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Mathis Wackernagel: The Ecological Footprint

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0:09the ecological for 0:09brent is a resource 0:12like we have accounting tools 0:13money that we want to know how 0:15we air 0:16and how much money do we spend in order to know to what extent 0:19our assets are going up or down we have to say 0:23need with our resources like any nation 0:26I think it's more important to know for nations how much ecological past they 0:30have available 0:31and how much they use rather than knowing how much call them the National 0:35Bank because in the end would be really depend on 0:37is national capital take a logically productive force 0:41nature and so the ecological footprint is a resource accounting to 0:45very much for this national capital so does this both on the income side 0:49on the supply-side and to find out how much you can alter productive capacities 0:54available 0:55and we do that number of hectares or 0:58acres for americans are available in a region or on the planet 1:02that provide these kinda say this is so they say these areas are forced air is 1:06pasture areas crop areas 1:08fisheries I'm but also the urban areas 1:12I'm which partially are built over but mostly 1:15stand out the most productive land that we have on this planet 1:19that's what we have available then we can compare what we have available 1:23against what we use I guess he had a farm job with them 1:27consume milk at the exit I'll do that 1:30graze have so this area necessary to protect provide for the cow that the 1:34bright the milk 1:35but I will eventually consume and so 1:39in the same way for all resources we can find out how much areas necessary 1:43to provide the resources that I consume for fibers 1:46food energy waz absorption et cetera 1:50that adds up to like as spread farmer and the word 1:54like by I don't know by 9 o'clock in the morning probably had already visited by 1:58three continents 1:59and I for their that's a I mean where some wall from 2:02New Zealand sheep I'm a drink some coffee from columbia 2:06I made some weed from I don't know the Midwestern United States 2:10so all these pieces are used by me to provide the resources that I consume 2:15so we can do a resource bounds for myself 2:18so we can find out how much ecological pasady I you can do it for a whole 2:22nation 2:23let me do it for the world as a whole lot BC is an average 2:26we have a bad one point 8 heck there's a 2:30ecological productive space available on this planet korean-american measures 2:34that would be about 4.4 2:35acres affect larger ecological market space that includes 2:39also productive see space then you can compare that 2:42would how much we use our global 2:45accounts a global average show that we use a bad 2:48five-and-a-half acres or 2.2 hectares 2:52I think a lot in brackets pay for a bite 25 percent more 2:56than what is available now you could ask how is it possible to use more space 3:01and will be available and essentially the same as how can we spend more money 3:06than what the air and of course that's possible for some time because we 3:09complete our assets in the same way 3:11

we can cut for example trees more rapidly than 3:15every grow sophie is to me had one acre forest 3:18and we use to forcibly harvest timber meant for was that twice the rate 3:23of what the forestry generates that's like using double the area 3:27either regenerate so the footprint of the product would be 3:30two acres by the by capacity would be 1 acres in this case would use 3:35twice the capacity what we have available we look at all the resource 3:40flows combined together 3:41humanity demands today actually lost numbers for 2003 3:46and we believe that are our conclusion comes to 3:50that we use about 30 percent more 35 percent more 3:54and what nature has available and what's the effect 3:58we call that overshoot that we use resources more rapidly 4:02needs to an ecological debt accumulation by caught in a bit 4:06like for example accumulation of co2 in the atmosphere deforestation 4:10soil loss or overuse the freshwater resources et cetera 4:15sir overall like the money in the long run 4:18we cannot spend more than would be an otherwise go to its bankruptcy and 4:22that's what the ecological footprint 4:24tries to avoid helping humanity a nation by nation 4:27to avoid ecological bankruptcy now bankruptcies a serious 4:30concerning in the financial world I would say an ecological weren't even 4:34more serious because that a financial bankruptcy can 4:36do that again make sure I'm gonna rebuild your life for the ecological 4:40bankruptcy 4:40it's very hard to move out of because ecological assets 4:43are the underlying wealth which any other wealthy pens

Mathis Wackernagel, co-creator of the Ecological Footprint, describes how this tool lets us calculate the amount of natural resources necessary to support our collective expenditure. Pointing to our current over-expenditure, he explains how the ecological footprint can help us avoid ecological bankruptcy.