Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
Humanity slid into the red this week and began racking up an ecological overdraft driven by unsustainable exploitation of the world’s resources, according to a report by the sustainable development organisation Global Footprint Network (GFN).
In little more than nine months, humans have used up all that nature can replenish in one year, and for the rest of 2006 are destined to eat into the planet’s ecological capital, the study claims.
The network calculated the day the global economy started to operate with an ecological deficit by comparing world demand for resources with the rate at which ecosystems can replenish them. The study draws on surveys from bodies such as the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation.
According to GFN, humanity first went into global ecological debt in 1987, when the year’s resources were spent by December 19. Since then, the date has leapt forward year by year to November 21 by 1995 and October 11 last year. The trend reveals the alarming effect of unsustainable lifestyles which are using up world reserves.
Ian Sample
