EARTH OVERSHOOT DAY? IT SOUNDS COMPLICATED BUT IT IS NOTHING BUT THE CALENDAR DATE FROM WHICH THE WORLD CONSUMES MORE THAN IT IS CAPABLE TO REGENERATE.
Each year, Earth Overshoot Day marks the date when humanity has used all the biological resources that earth can renew during the entire year.
Earth Overshoot Day 2020 lands on August 22, more than three weeks later than in 2019, according to Global Footprint Network.
Humanity currently uses 60% more than what can be renewed – or as much as if we lived on 1.6 planet.
Last week EOD was on July 29th, more than three weeks earlier than in 2020.The date reflects the 9.3% reduction of humanity’s ecological footprint from January 1st to Earth Overshoot Day compared to the same period of the last year, which is a direct consequence of the coronavirus-induced lockdowns around the world.
Accordingly with the Global Footprint Network (footprintnetwork.org) 4 key factors define a country’s demand for resources:
1. how cities are built;
2. how energy is generated and consumed;
3. how its citizens eat;
4. how many inhabitants it has.
The decrease in wood harvest and the reduction in Co2 emissions resulting from the combustion of fossil resources are the main drivers behind the reduction in the growth curve of the human ecological footprint in 2020.
This positive figure is however far from the result necessary to achieve an ecological balance.
The Global Footprint Network wish is a world where humanity lives on our planet’s ecological budget by design rather than by disaster, so that all thrive within the means of earth.
It is absolutely necessary to focus on the regeneration and on the reuse of the available resources trying to achieve both ecological balance and people’s well-being, two inextricable components of sustainability.
Lessons carrying us forward:
– First of all, statistical trends can be drastically changed even in extremely limited time horizons;
– Governments are capable of acting swiftly, both in terms of regulations and speding, when they put human lives above all else;
. Businesees and individuals can effectively aligh and cllaborate in the pursuit of a shared goal
Let’s not waste the lesson learned sacrificing it to well-orchestrated marketing campaigns and pure economic goals. We have to respect the word SUSTAINABILITY trying to combine it with two equally important words such as transparency and seriousness.
If we produce a boardshort with regenerated fabric personalizing it with a nice tag featuring an eye catching STOP PLASTIC claim in red capitol red letters and then we wrap it along with a bottle of Franciacorta in kilos of pastic probabily we are simply green washing causing a damage to those who are seriously trying to change the status quo.
In Italy the DEFICIT of exceeding the BIOCAPACITY is equal to 371%.
Let’s be sure not to waste the momentum to sell some beachwear and few bottles of sparkling wine. We don’t need that. Really.
