The European Union’s ‘ecological footprint’ is estimated to be more than twice its own biocapacity. The term ‘ecological footprint’ refers to a measurement of human resources that compares the rate the planet is using its resources with its ability to renew them. Europe is consuming 4.8 hectares per capita a year (its footprint) but its capacity to regenerate is only 2.2 hectares per capita, leaving it running at a ‘deficit’ of 2.6. This reflects a wider trend on the global level with the study highlighting the fact that the world’s overall ‘ecological footprint’ has tripled since 1961 and predicting that by the middle of the century “large-scale ecosystem collapse” is likely.
Within the EU-25, large discrepancies are evident, with the likes of Spain and Greece having increased the size of their footprint by almost 100% since 1975, leaving an imprint that now measures more than three and-a-half times their capacity to regenerate. This is in sharp contrast with Finland, Sweden and Latvia, which have more than four times the size of their 'footprint' to spare.
However, the ecological footprint theory is disputed by some specialists who argue that applying the earth's carrying capacity to human populations is flawed. Humans, the critics argue, "can and do increase the carrying capacity of their environment to meet their needs", for example in the case of renewable energies. Moreover, they say, carrying capacity has limited relevance when resources can be traded to make up for their scarcity. Additional uncertainties include calculation methods to evaluate land space needs or the lack of distinction between land uses that are sustainable and those that are not.
James Leape, WWF’s director-general said: “As countries improve the well-being of their people they are bypassing the goal of sustainability and going into what we call ‘overshoot’ — using far more resources than the planet can sustain.”
