The Capitalist Footprint

Naomi Klein points out, “climate change has less to do with carbon than with capitalism.”

I agree. It is so much more than just carbon, that it makes me wonder why carbon was fingered as the kingpin of kicking Mother Nature to the curb.

It's not just our carbon footprint, it is our capitalist footprint.

It's about a system that wants us to spend on experiences now, rather than on things. The message is "it doesn't really matter what you spend it on, just keep on spending".

“The essence of capitalism is to turn nature into commodities and commodities into capital. The live green earth is transformed into dead gold bricks, with luxury items for the few and toxic slag heaps for the many. The glittering mansion overlooks a vast sprawl of shanty towns, wherein a desperate, demoralized humanity is kept in line with drugs, television, and armed force.” 

- Michael Parenti

Consuming experiences is still consuming, and don't they have their own massive footprint?

The planet is affected whenever we spend money regardless of what we spend it on.

My solution has been to just stop spending. I have found that does wonders for both your carbon footprint, and your capitalist footprint. 

Not to mention your bank account, and the amount of clutter in your home.

Buy nothing. Still be happy.

It's possible.

My simple life is all the proof I need.

10 More Ways to Tell That You Are Living Simply

When you live simply, you do thing differently. You are an island of calm and control in a stormy ocean of out-of-control, hedonistic consumerism.

Here are some other ways to tell that you are living simply.

10 Ways to Tell That You Are Living Simply

1. Your idea of an exciting evening is waiting for your can's lids to ''POP'' after taking them out of the canner.

2. You are older than 12 and still ride a bike on a regular basis.

3. You have to explain to people that you home is sparse because you are a minimalist, not poor.

4. You know how to cook, and like it.

5. You value time more than money, and relationships more than things.

6. It feels better to get rid of stuff than it does to acquire more.

7. Diogenes, Saint Francis of Assisi, Henry David Thoreau, Gandhi, and Marie Kondo are familiar names.

8. Your garden is bigger than your outdoor entertainment area, and might actually BE your outdoor entertainment area.

9. There is no need for off-site storage space for extra stuff because you don't have any extra stuff.

And finally,

10. You aspire to have the environmental footprint of an average Bangladeshi, and you actually know what that is - about 2 acres as opposed to 20 or more for most everyone you know. 

How do you tell if you are living simply?

Increasing Ecological Footprints

There is one important way that I can tell that politicians of the West are lying when they say they are concerned about climate change, and that is their promotion of high levels of immigration into their countries.

Why even talk about net-zero, or the end of oil, when you are in the business of increasing the ecological footprint of millions of people?

These same politicians are incentivizing people to move from low eco-footprint countries to high eco-footprint countries. 

Millions of people from places like Cuba, Haiti and Honduras, or from other low-footprint countries like Bangladesh and India, are being invited into countries that have some of the highest footprints on the globe.

The result is an overall increase of the average global eco-footprint, which means an increase in not only consumption, but also pollution and resource depletion.

I used to believe in the goals of environmentalism and climate change mitigation. Until about 2019 that is.

Over the past few tumultuous years I have discarded just about everything that I thought I knew and believed and am starting over from scratch.

I am going against the grain and doing my own research, and drawing my own conclusions from what I see.

I am afraid that the whole climate hand-wringing, like the pandemic and resulting medical tyranny, is just a power grab. 

It is all about control and profit, and has nothing to do with "democracy", or "saving the Earth".

Please, faux eco-politicians of the West, tell me how increasing the eco-footprint of millions of citizens of 1 - 2 planet countries by bringing them to 3 - 4 planet countries helps your green agenda?

Either you fight climate change, or you increase the average global eco-footprint through high levels of immigration.

You can't say you are doing both and be taken seriously by rational thinkers. 

Unless climate change mitigation is not your agenda. 

And if not, what is?

Backward To Go Forward

My neighbour's fully restored 1940s farm tractor cutting hay.

Since 1961 the American ecological footprint has increased by 160%.

To what end? 

Is life 160% better? Are people 160% happier?

If that 160% increase in resource consumption hasn't made us any happier, then let us cut it out and see what happens.

It is mostly waste for the sole purpose of private profit, and much to the detriment of people and the planet.

I am imagining a situation where the people care so much about our unique and stunningly beautiful planet that they are willing to cut the waste from their lives in order to honour Earth's sacred designation as the giver and sustainer of life itself.

Like all indigenous people do. And like we all used to do not so long ago. 

We are going to have to go backward to those roots if we are to go forward with any success. 

One planet living is the goal, and it can be  done. 

Because we love this planet.

Don't we?

Things I Hang On To - Glass Jars

There are some things that come into my home that don't go in the garbage or recycling. That is because they are not garbage, or recycling. In my house, they are useful resources.

Glass jars are in this category. I am happy I have a few stored up since there aren't too many glass jars coming into our home lately. 

That is because we are now making some of the things that we used to buy at the grocery store. Things that come in glass bottles like a wide variety of pickles, and jam.

Case in point are pickled jalapeños. Why buy them (unless you don't have a jar to put them in) when they are SO easy and fast to make? The same goes for all pickles, and lots of other things, too.

We pickle 2 small jars of jalapeños at a time, which will last us a few weeks. The recipe is for refrigerator pickles, so they do not need to be water or pressure canned. See below for recipe.

I find it very satisfying to make as much of my food from scratch as I can, and pickles of all sorts are an easy way of fulfilling that goal.

I did not taste an excellent cucumber pickle until I made them myself because I like spicy pickles and the store bought variety don't cut it in that department. 

About the only good thing about store bought pickles, in my opinion, is the glass jar they come in. I like the jars more than the pickles inside.

The best part for me is that by reclaiming self-reliance skills, I can reduce my dependence on the conventional economy. You know, the one currently breaking down. 

Reducing dependence on the system is always my overriding goal, and always has been. That is more important today than it has ever been in my lifetime.

Glass jars are things I have always hung on to, and now I can see the wisdom of that, with pandemic shortages affecting availability of official canning jars, although I know they aren't equivalent.

Has anyone out there tried hot water canning with reused store-bought jars?

I saw a video recently of an Italian family that has been growing/making and canning tomato sauce for generations. I noticed that none of the jars they used were official canning jars. 

All the jars they used were reused with reused lids. They had a humungous pot of boiling water on a fire out in the yard, and just tossed the tomato sauce jars into it haphazardly for processing. 

According to all official information, these people were definitely rogue canners.

We are told we should worry about botulism and breaking glass when using ordinary reused jars, but the grandma in the video had been using the same method for 40 years and was still around to share her tomato sauce with her grandkids.

I always hang on to glass jars, and they are very useful in many ways, but can they be used for canning? 

Is that Italian grandma crazy, or does she just like living dangerously?

Or are mason jar manufacturers overstating the importance of their expensive and now hard to get product?

Recipe

Refrigerator Pickles: Jalapeños

Ingredients

- 4 or 5 medium/large jalapeño cut into disks

- white vinegar to fill jar half full

- water to top up jars

- optional ingredients include a pinch of salt, sugar, spices, or garlic.

Directions

Cut jalepenos, place in squeaky clean jars. Fill half way with vinegar. Top up with water, and add any optional ingredients.

Close jars, agitate gently for a minute or so. Set on kitchen counter for 24 hours. After that time, turn jars upside down for another 24 hours. Then put in fridge and enjoy. 

Good in fridge for up to 4 weeks. 

You may never buy pickled jalepenos from the store again. Unless you need a 250ml glass jar.

Borrowing From The Future: Earth Overshoot Day

Earth Overshoot Day is the day on which humanity's resource consumption for the year exceeds Earth's capacity to regenerate those resources that year. This day has been getting earlier and earlier since record keeping began.

What will EOD be this year? It is not known yet, but this dismal day was July 29th last year, meaning after that date we were in overshoot and consuming more than the Earth can provide in one year. 

Compare that to 1987 when we started borrowing from the future on October 23rd. We are going in the wrong direction.

The promise of consumerism is that everyone everywhere can have everything. Eventually. That is the kind of fantasy thinking that has lead to a degraded environment. The truth is, our planet is in peril due to overconsumption - we are using too many resources too quickly.

Another whopper, that you would think most of us would have noticed a long, long time ago, is that we can satisfy our infinite wants in a finite system. How? No one ever explains this one. 

Ask someone who believes this myth and you will hear mumbling about how "technology will save us", which then trails off to an uncomfortable silence. 

Technology has gotten us into this problem, and the shortcomings of it won't be overcome with more. If highly complex methods are the problem, reducing complexity is the solution. 

Earth Overshoot Day has been before the end of the year since the early 1970s, when we left one-planet-living behind.

It seems that not many people realize this, or they would surely change their ways. Right? Because when we borrow from the future, we end up depleting resources while killing everything in the process.

This is the shape that our ecosystem (from Greek oikos, house) is in, and that is what earthovershootday.org has been tracking since 2006. 

Today, their data show, we are using resources at nearly twice the rate that nature can replace. 

In other words, our shared house is in trouble. 

We can't borrow from the future forever. Sooner or later (but probably sooner), our overconsumption will bring the house down with ripple effects that will make the pandemic lockdown look mild in comparison.

"What can I do?", you may ask. 

Easy.

Simplify, simplify, simplify.

Mother Earth Will Fix Things If We Don't

Earth's human population, given current levels of consumption, is not sustainable. As such, it must be dealt with one way or another.

For example, fatal diseases are Nature’s way of controlling population levels. 

They spread quickly when numbers of individuals in any population increase past the carrying capacity of their environment.

It does not matter if we are talking about fruit flies, lemmings, or humans.

If we don't solve our population/overconsumption problem, Mother Earth will do it for us. 

Her judgement can not be avoided, if we continue to ignore these issues. 

"Why didn't you warn us?", we will wail.

And she will say, 

"First I sent floods. 

Then I sent plagues of locusts. 

Since no one seemed to notice, 

I sent a pandemic.

I suggest you fix your problems.

Or I will."

One Planet Living

A lot of people want to know what they can do personally to address the many threats to our environment. I do, too. 

A lot is said about how we have mistreated our life support system, but not much in the way of what can be done to reverse the decline. 

Some think that the system that created the problems can be trusted to solve them. But isn't green capitalism an oxymoron? Capitalism only works with infinite growth, and planet destroying infinite growth is not green. 

Anyone calling for system change, though, is seen as a radical on the fringe and summarily denounced.

What is needed now is a broad perspective that allows us to address our entire system, especially population, lifestyle and consumption.

Sooner rather than later, we will have to discuss strategies for One Planet Living.  It is not a radical notion. Rather, it is the only way to live on one planet.

The following is from "Why We Must Talk About Population" by Erik Assadourian.

One-Planet Living 

In Is Sustainability Still Possible?, Jennie Moore and William Rees explored what a one-planet lifestyle would look like (in a world with 7 billion not 9.5 billion) and their analysis shows that if we lived within Earth’s limits, gone would be the days of driving personal vehicles, flying, eating meat, living in large homes, and essentially the entire consumer society that we know today. 

Frankly, that’s fine with me, considering the ecological, social and health costs of modern society—but most will not accept that. And considering that—and that policymakers and economists and even most environmentalists still believe further economic growth is possible and even beneficial—it’s increasingly hard to imagine any scenario other than a horrifying ecological collapse in our future.

System change, not climate change. 

While we are working that, it would be helpful to start living like we only had one planet to depend on. 

That is something we can all do now.

Earth Overshoot Day

We are approaching the day of the year at which human consumption exceeds the capacity of nature to regenerate, a sad moment dubbed "Earth Overshoot Day". Unsurprisingly, this day has been coming sooner and sooner since the 1970s.

The 70s was the decade that the globe moved from a sustainable level of consumption into overshoot. From that point on we have been drawing our resources from our Bank of Nature account, which is getting drawn down faster than it can be replenished. 

When is your country's Earth Overshoot Day? It is an embarrassing May 8 for Canada,
much sooner than the global average of August 1st. 
Find out more about your country here.

Our resource account is also getting drawn down faster and faster each year.


Past Earth Overshoot Dates


1970 - December 29

1980 - November 3

1990 - October 11

2000 - September 23

2010 - August 8

2018 - August 1


Since the 1970s we have gone from one planet living to 1.7 planet living. While this issue unfolds right before our eyes, we choose to not to see. Not only that, the precipice that we will plunge over is just ahead, and some world "leaders" are stepping on the gas pedal. 

We should fight this dangerous trend with all our might. Things will not change until we do. Our passivity is their advantage.

What is your personal Earth Overshoot Day? Find out by clicking on this image.

Regardless of how often we are told to keep calm, and carry on with our recreational shopping, driving, flying, meat eating, and producing waste like there is no tomorrow, we will not escape the repercussions of degrading our planet. 

Solutions

There are many doable right now solutions that could be implemented personally, at the community level, nationally, and globally. For now, the majority of high consuming nations and their citizens have chosen to ignore them. 

But how long can that continue before the people choose to see, decide to do something about it, and change the way we do things? Our planet has limits that can not be ignored forever.

That doesn't mean we are powerless - we can do a lot as individuals.

• become politically active: make phone calls, write letters, texts, tweets and emails, vote, run for office, support a rational, pro-environment candidate that thinks for themselves and wants to serve the people and the planet.
• the most rational and straightforward personal action would be to simplify a multi-planet lifestyle to the point of single-planet living. A challenge, to be sure, but entirely doable, not to mention, necessary if we are to survive.
• support your local economy
• eat a plant based diet, or if you can't give up meat, eat less of it (vegetarian foods are just as tasty, satisfying, and nutritious).
• drive, fly, and travel less often.
• use public transportation.
• limit the use of plastic.
• talk to others about Earth Overshoot Day.
• share what you are doing to respond to a clear and present danger to human survival.
• reduce desires and unrealistically high expectations
• find joy in simplicity
• plant a garden

I calculated the Overshoot Day for Linda and I (see image above), and came up with March 14, 2019. The Global Footprint Network told me: 

"Hurray! If everyone lived like you, there would be no Overshoot Day! We would only need 0.8 Earths." 

I dearly hope that is accurate. Even if it is, there is always more that we can do to reduce our impact on the Earth and all its inhabitants. 

I envision a time when there is no Overshoot Day, like not so long ago in the 70s. I believe it can be done. But will we do it in time? Start now, and avoid the rush.

What is My Fair Share of the Planet's Resources?

Some of us are taking more than our fair share.

Take the number of people on the planet. Divide that ever-increasing number into the finite number of acres that represents Earth's total resources. We end up with the number of acres per person, which is about 4 acres, and that doesn't leave anything for all the other non-human planetary inhabitants.

"It is only since the industrial revolution that resource use and consumption has skyrocketed. The US was built on foundations of frugality, yet today, North Americans are the world's greatest consumers. 

If the world's people consumed as North Americans, we would need five Earths. The link between consumer habits and global warming, war, species extinction, and social injustice are often lost amidst fast paced advertising and a throw-away consciousness." 

- Jim Merkel

Human population

- 7.4 billion


Acres per person available today

- 4.5 acres/person


If we leave 75% wild for the 25 million other species on Earth

- 1 acre/ person


Average acres/person used by humans 

Global average - 5.8 acres

United States - 24 acres

Canada - 22 acres

United Kingdom - 13 acres

Russia - 11 acres

Afghanistan - 0.75 acres


It is not a big stretch to conclude that ecological overshoot can not go on forever, and  that the sooner we do something about it, the better.

If not everyone can live a modern consumer lifestyle, how do we decide who can and who can't? Can anyone, if it leads to ecological overshoot and collapse?

Eco-Footprint Overshoot

In my lifetime, human consumption of resources has exceeded the productive capacity of our planet.

Everyone has an ecological footprint. We all need to use the earth’s resources to survive. But some of us are wearing ridiculously large, floppy clown shoes while others have existed forever in tiny slippers.

One average Canadian footprint is the same as that of 12 average Ethiopians. How big a footprint is too big? How much is too much? 

Since the 1980s we have been living unsustainably by draining stocks of "natural capital" faster than nature can replenish them. It is a fatal mistake to think we can take more resources than the earth can provide, and do so indefinitely. We have been doing so for about 3 decades now, and the rate of overshoot is getting faster with each passing year.

The size of a person’s eco-footprint depends on many factors. Do you grow your own food? Do you walk or drive to places? Do you use renewable or non-renewable energy sources? Is that a rice and bean dish I see on your plate? What kind of climate do you live in?

These factors, and so many more, make a difference in the amount of resources required to sustain our lifestyle, and therefore the size of our footprint.

ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINTS AROUND THE WORLD


Average number of productive acres the Earth provides per person (each human's eco-footprint "fair share"), not leaving anything left over for other living things - 4.5 acres

Average amount per person if we include the needs of other living things - 1 acre 

Average global footprint per person  - 5.6 acres

FOOTPRINT BY COUNTRY

In an age of ecological overshoot, having a smaller footprint is more desirable, so I have listed countries starting with those with the smallest footprint.


Afghanistan - 0.75 acres

Bangladesh - 1 acre

India - 2 acres

Ethiopia - 2.4 acres

Iraq - 3 acres

China - 4 acres

Mexico - 6 acres

Turkey - 6.7 acres

Russia - 11 acres

New Zealand - 12 acres

France - 12 acres

Germany - 12.5 acres

United Kingdom - 13 acres

Spain - 13.4 acres

Netherlands - 15 acres

Australia - 17 acres

Canada - 22 acres

United States - 24 acres

We need to reduce our lifestyle shoe size in so-called "developed" societies. Ecological overshoot can not go on forever without degrading the environment to the point of mass extinctions. Either we need to reduce our population, or reduce our ecological footprints. Preferably both.

Of the two, reducing our consumption of Earth's resources is probably the more attainable solution. If resource depletion is the problem, reducing our demands on those resources is the answer. I think this can be done while positively affecting one's overall quality of life.

It makes me wonder. Does the size of a person's ecological footprint transmit to happiness and contentment in life? Are humans in North America happier than humans in countries with a smaller average eco-footprint? Or does a larger footprint just mean a larger amount of waste and useless excess?

Live softly, and leave a small footprint. That would be the best holiday gift possible if you are considering getting something for Mother Earth this season, and year round.

Professor Dumpster

Dr. Dumpster's diminutive dives.

Jeff Wilson, a Texas teacher of biological sciences, is a person dedicated to teaching by example. He didn't just live in a tiny home the size of a dumpster - his home for a year long experiment in sustainability was a dumpster.

Therefore his nickname, Professor Dumpster.

The Dr. of Dumpsterism perfected the craft of thriving in a 33 square foot former waste receptacle on the grounds of his school in Austin. Rather than lament the loss of luxury, Wilson sings the praises of really small footprint living.

Some of the immediate advantages he found were:

• lower rent
• lower utility payments
• owning fewer things
• less time spent doing chores
• shorter commute (about 90 seconds on foot)
• less money spent on unnecessary possessions
• more community involvement
• reduced mental noise

Most of all, Professor Wilson said that living lightly gave him a new sense of freedom. And while shacking up in his humble abode involved some sacrifice, he said that he cried when his project ended and he moved out.

You don't need to dwell in a dumpster to feel the goodness of small footprint living. Its benefits can be realized anywhere in any place, one decision at a time.

Good People Everywhere

"There sure are good people commenting on NBA".

So says Linda, my partner in simple living, and contributor/editor of this blog. Not only has she actively participated in creating the NBA blog, she has also been a co-architect of our NBA lifestyle. She also reads every comment that is posted here, and she likes what she sees.

After Linda pointed out the awesome crowd that has been drawn to our little effort on the Internet, I decided to take a closer look at where all the good people come from.

Seeing as we are residing in a part of what is known as North America, it makes sense that most of our visitors are from this geographical area. And since the USA is so much larger than Canada or Mexico, I am not surprised that so many NBA visitors are from there.

I find it ironic that the country that perfected consumerism logs the most visits on our non-consumer oriented blog. Perhaps together we will perfect ecologically appropriate post-consumer lifestyles.

Happily, support for this blog and low waste/low consumption lifestyles is widespread. NBA has welcomed visitors from almost every country in the world. Many of the countries that have not visited have lifestyles that make our low consumption look high-consumption in comparison.

May they see, if they do visit here, a precautionary warning against joining the consumer frenzy in the first place. They could teach us a thing or two about getting by on a minimal amount of resources.

Two-thirds of our visits come from the top 10 countries, the rest divided between all the others.

Top 10 Countries With Most Visitors to NBA

1. United States
2. Canada
3. United Kingdom
4. Australia
5. India
6. Netherlands
7. Germany
8. France
9. Philippines
10. New Zealand

In this crazy world we may sometimes wonder where all the good people have gone. They are where they have always been  - everywhere, including here on NBA.

So here is to the good people that have visited here and supported our blogging and lifestyle efforts through repeated visits and the sharing of such good ideas and feedback in comments. Here is to good people everywhere that are reducing their consumption and increasing their enjoyment of life. Thank you.

About The Book Cover Above

(From: Goodreads)

Good People Everywhere

by Lynea Gillen, Kristina Swarner (Illustrations)

Winner of Mom's Choice Award, Teacher's Choice and Moonbeam Children's Book Awards

A colorful picture book that will warm the hearts of children and adults alike, each of its pages contain endearing examples and vibrant illustrations to inspire children to grow into grateful, caring, and giving people. It provides a wonderful way to calm children before sleep, ease their fears, and help them develop an appreciation for good work. Also included are activity pages to help children practice skills for creating gratitude, compassion, and beauty in daily life.

Hardcover, 32 pages

Published August 1st 2012 by Three Pebble Press, LLC

ISBN 0979928982 (ISBN13: 9780979928987)

Rubber Time

Life is "wheely" short. The transition from baby carriage to wheelchair can seem like a quick one.

Life can be short. Way too short to waste in activities like shopping for things we don't need. Or working jobs we dislike, or staying in relationships that are toxic.

But when we concentrate on the things that are important, like sitting quietly beside a brook and listening, time can stretch out. When I play guitar or garden I am not even aware of the passage of time. Timelessness.

Seneca was a stoic philosopher that left us with a collection of ageless wisdom related to the art of living and the nature of time.

“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. 

So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it. 

You are living as if destined to live for ever; your own frailty never occurs to you; you don’t notice how much time has already passed, but squander it as though you had a full and overflowing supply. You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire. 

You must match time’s swiftness with your speed in using it, and you must drink quickly as though from a rapid stream that will not always flow…" 

- from Seneca’s book De Brevitate Vitae, or "On The Shortness of Life"

Life can be short, but it can also be long enough. From experience I can say that there is a time shift when we abandon the distractions of Consumerland. Life is different on Rubber Time - it stretches and life feels not only better, but also longer.

Less pursuit of luxury, and more of simple living is not only ecologically approved, but Seneca approved as well.

Disposable World

Global garbage production is on the rise partly due to there being a shorter life cycle for products. This shorter life cycle (aided by planned obsolescence) is more profitable for manufacturers, but more detrimental to our pocket books and the natural world.

From disposable cutlery to computer printers with self-destruct chips that engage after a preset number of prints, to frequent upgrades that make previous models unwanted, we have been living a disposable lifestyle that has been creating mountains of waste.

The apparent convenience of disposable stuff is harmful as it hides unintended consequences - solving one problem creates a host of new ones. Convenience now often turns out to be terribly inconvenient later.

As long as our brainwashing leads us to believe that such flagrant waste is acceptable, we will be reluctant to choose more sustainable practices.

Disposable stuff, disposable lives, disposable world VS quality stuff, quality lives, quality world. We decide.

It can be as easy as just washing the spoon when you are done with it.

More Sustainable Living - It's Not Easy Being Green

"It's not easy being green."
"Said it, you did."

I recently changed the NBA blog description. I thought it important to add the word 'More' in front of "Sustainable Living" lest someone think that I believe that the way I live (as spartan as it may be) is actually "sustainable". It's not. Or is it?

What I have found over the years is that Kermit the frog was right - it's not easy being green. Sustainability often seems like an illusive goal that is always just a bit out of reach of modern living folks.

But what is sustainability exactly, and do we have to become hunter-gatherers, or live in caves to attain this ultimate green goal?

There are many definitions of sustainability currently in use. One of the most commonly used definitions is from the 1987 U.N. Brundtland Commission Report:

“Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

The Earth Charter is more specific and envisions:

 “a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace.”

Sustainability can be applied to ecosystems, nations, as well as the full range of our own individual activities. We can assess the sustainability of our countries and lifestyles, using a tool such as an Ecological Footprint calculator.

Whatever it is, it is clear that by any definition many countries, including my own, are a long way from realizing anything close to sustainable living. But we can work toward becoming more sustainable in our decisions.

Using a footprint calculator at the Global Footprint Network, I determined that I have an eco-footprint of about 3.9 global hectares. That sounds great compared to the average Canadian with a footprint of about 6 hectares, but it is still over the level of sustainability which is considered to be about 2 hectares.

I think they overestimated my footprint.


Over at footprint.org, at the end of the questions I was told, "Congratulations, you are living an ecologically conscientious lifestyle. If everyone lived like you do, we would need only 0.74 Earths."

The second calculator is more detailed than the one at GFN, and must use different methods because they say, "There are only 15.71 global hectares available per person on a renewable basis." My footprint was 11.66 hectares.


So am I living sustainably? It seems to depend on the footprint calculator one uses. Try them and see what you come up with. Either way, we can always get greener.

I Can Get Greener

There are a few ways I can reduce my footprint further:

1. Ditch my vehicle and take public transportation.
2. Live in a more energy efficient home.
3. Eat more local foods, preferably grown in my own garden.
4. Install a solar energy power system (even a small one would make a difference).

Living greener certainly will help reduce the all pervasive cognitive dissonance we experience over our current high consumption lifestyles. We know in our hearts that using more than our fair share, and more than the planet can replace, is not right.

It's not easy being green, but it is not impossible either. We may be required to make radical shifts to the way we live, but chances are our new sustainable lifestyle will be more enjoyable than the old one we need to leave behind.

Eco-Footprint Monday

In 2008 the average Global Ecological Footprint was 2.7 hectares - the sustainable average
is 2.0 hectares per person.

Bangladesh has an average eco-footprint of about 0.7 hectares, and yet they ranked 11th on the Happy Planet Index. 

Canada, with a much larger GDP and footprint, ranked as the 65th happiest nation.

Calculating an eco-footprint is a useful measure of environmental sustainability, or ongoing ecological health. The average shoe size of a Canadian for instance, is a large clown shoe made of plastic compared to that of Bangladesh which is a tiny bamboo sandal.

The Ecological footprint is the amount of environment needed to produce the goods and services necessary to support a particular lifestyle.

The size of a person's footprint depends on many factors. Some of these we have direct control over, including the choices we make on the products we purchase, what we eat and how we travel. Others are beyond our immediate control.

Government and business have a large effect on the size of everyone's eco-footprint. They have a responsibility to reduce the impact of their operations, just as we can make different choices to reduce our own impact.

If all of humanity lived like an average Indonesian, only two-thirds of the planet's biocapacity would be used; if everyone lived like an average Argentinean, humanity would demand more than half an additional planet; and if everyone lived like an average Canadian, a total of 3.5 Earths would be required to regenerate humanity's annual demand on nature.

Divided equally among all humans, each of us would get roughly 2 global hectares of bio-capacity to sustain us. At this level the environment would be able to replace as much as we take, and sustainability would be achieved.

In 2008 the global average ecological footprint was 2.7 hectares per person. The average for Canadians is just over 6 hectares.

The WWF reports:

"...that Canadians are using approximately 3.5 times their share of the Earth’s annual productivity, part of a global trend of increasing demand for resources by a growing population. 

This trend is putting tremendous pressures on our planet’s biodiversity and is threatening our future security, health and well-being. The correlated decline in biodiversity threatens not only the balance of our ecosystems, but economic opportunities."

Reducing our Ecological Footprint, individually and nationally, can lead to happier people, and a happier planet.

Walk softly and leave a small footprint

Ecological Footprint By Country

Ecological Overshoot: Business-as-usual (red line) shows why scientists are looking for
 other habitable planets to move to after Earth is finished

The Global Footprint Network, like this blog, is not buying anything having to do with the status quo and promoting high consumption lifestyles. The GFN and NBA also share a common vision, which is "sustainable, one-planet living". In order to achieve this, lifestyle changes will be required in high-consumption nations.

The information the GFN produces allows us to see where different nations fall when it comes to ecological footprint (resources used), and biocapacity (biological productivity, or resources available).

Each person's fair share of the earth's resources would amount to 2.1 hectares (5.1 acres) if resources were shared equally. For comparisons sake, in 2008 the United Arab Emirates had the highest global footprint of about 9 hectares (23.7 acres), while Malawi had the lowest footprint at 0.5 hectares (1.2 acres).

The Global Footprint Network, while addressing the ecological overshoot represented by the graph above, states:

"Individuals and institutions worldwide must begin to recognize ecological limits. We must begin to make ecological limits central to our decision-making and use human ingenuity to find new ways to live, within the Earth’s bounds.

This means investing in technology and infrastructure that will allow us to operate in a resource-constrained world. It means taking individual action, and creating the public demand for businesses and policy makers to participate.

Using tools like the Ecological Footprint to manage our ecological assets is essential for humanity’s survival and success. Knowing how much nature we have, how much we use, and who uses what is the first step, and will allow us to track our progress as we work toward our goal of sustainable, one-planet living."

The following graphs track the per-person resource demand (Ecological Footprint), and biocapacity in the order of the top 10 countries from which NBA's visitors originate. Footprint varies with consumption and production efficiency.

Biocapacity varies each year with ecosystem management, agricultural practices (such as fertilizer use and irrigation), ecosystem degradation, weather, and population size.

An overall ecological deficit is shown by red shading, while an overall surplus is shown by green.  If your country is not in this list you can find a national footprint graph for your region at the GFN website.

1. The United States

2. Canada

3. UK

4.  Australia

5. Phillipines

6. Russia

7. India

8. Germany

9. Netherlands

10. Brazil

This information shows that the lifestyles of many countries is beyond the level of sustainability. It also shows we all need each other. Countries with an ecological deficit must procure resources from countries with ecological surpluses.

As individuals we have to take responsibility for the size of our own ecological footprints. We can approach living within the constraints of global ecological limitations, and only consume our fair share.

You can calculate your personal ecological footprint at the Global Footprint Network.

All those scientists peering into space are discovering that good planets are hard to find. I figure our best bet is taking care of the one we have.