Eco Footprint Metrics www.footprintnetwork.org 3270 Lakeshore Ave Oakland, CA 94605 USA +1-510-839-8879 (-0800 GMT) How many Earths are needed to meet the resource requirements of humanity?

Eco Footprint Resource demand (Ecological Footprint) for the world as a whole is = population x per capita consumption Reflects the efficiency with which resources are turned into consumption products. Resource supply (biocapacity) varies each year with ecosystem management, agricultural practices (such as fertilizer use and irrigation), ecosystem degradation, and weather

EU and Selected States: Population

EU and Selected States: GDP (€)

EU and Selected States: Human Development Index

EU and Selected States: Footprint

Number of Earths Figure 1 shows the ratio between the world's demand and the world's biocapacity in each year, and how this ratio has changed over time. Expressed in terms of "number of Earths," the biocapacity of the Earth is always 1 (represented by the horizontal blue line).

Figure 2 tracks, in absolute terms, the world's average per person Ecological Footprint and per person biocapacity over a 40-year period. An additional dotted line (scale on right side of graph) shows the growth of the human population from 1961-2001.

The Ecological Footprint of the EU-25 has risen by almost 70 per cent since 1961. Europeans now require 4.9 globally average hectares per person to provide for their lifestyle. As the continent can only supply 2.2 global hectares per person, Europeans rely on the rest of the world to make up this increasing deficit – effectively more than another Europe.