The unsustainable use of our planet's resources needs to be tackled from different angles and multiple levels of governance. As the human population urbanizes, having access to reliable, cross-cutting, quantitative city-level sustainability metrics is key to understanding the environmental impacts of urban dwellers and the role cities can play in the 21st century sustainability challenge. Framing the environmental pillar of urban sustainability with an overarching metric like the Ecological Footprint informs stakeholders and citizens about a city's overall pressure on the biosphere. In Portugal, six cities established a pioneering collaborative project to guide their transition to sustainability and support city governance; this paper presents the results of the first phase of the project. We tracked annual demand for natural resources and ecological services by the city residents and compared it against the “carrying capacity” of the cities' ecological assets. We then assessed the ability of this new data to increase local environmental awareness and support local public policies in Portugal and elsewhere. Lessons from this study inform the ongoing debate on the Ecological Footprint's usefulness as sustainability metric for cities, and point to specific policy insights for managing key consumption sectors and reaching key targets such as the UN SDGs.
Sustainable management and informed policy making at the sub-national level requires an understanding of regional resource base regeneration and the demand it places on wider geographical areas. Ecological Footprint is one of the most widely used and accepted ecological accounting methodologies and available for calculating multiple consumption categories such as food, housing and transportation. Japan's 47 prefectures are diverse in their urbanization and ageing situations and provide an opportunity for understanding the relationship between regional socioeconomic and demographic factors and Ecological Footprint outcomes. To assess potential environmental impacts and planning implications of future urbanization and ageing, we analyzed the existing relationships between the proportion of urban and elderly populations and incomes, and the total and categorical Ecological Footprint per capita. We used a standard top-down scaling methodology to quantify the Ecological Footprint of prefectures, that included three steps: 1) acquiring national level data of Ecological Footprints, 2) applying environmental extended multi-regional input-output model to derive Ecological Footprint values by economic sector, and 3) scaling down Ecological Footprints to the prefecture level with household expenditure survey and other data sources. We show that Ecological Footprint per capita varies considerable among prefectures, being highest in Tokyo (5.24 global hectare) and lowest in Yamanashi (4.06 global hectare). Prefectures with a higher proportion of urban and elderly population had high total and food Ecological Footprint per capita. Prefectures with higher income per capita also had higher total and food Ecological Footprint per capita. Lower Ecological Footprints of less urbanized prefectures provide an argument for economic decentralization. Policy makers in ageing regions should consider supporting local food activities with elderly populations, as processed food dominates majority part of the food Ecological Footprint.
Securing food for growing populations while minimizing environmental externalities is becoming a key topic in the current sustainability debate. This is particularly true in the Mediterranean region, which is characterized by scarce natural resources and increasing climate-related impacts. This paper focuses on the pressure Mediterranean people place on the Earth ecosystems because of their food consumption and sourcing patterns and then explores ways in which such pressure can be reduced. To do so, it uses an Ecological-Footprint-Extended Multi-Regional Input-Output (EF-MRIO) approach applied to 15 Mediterranean countries. Results indicate that food consumption is a substantial driver of the region's ecological deficit, whereby demand for renewable resources and ecosystems services outpaces the capacity of its ecosystems to provide them. Portugal, Malta and Greece are found to have the highest per capita food Footprints (1.50, 1.25 and 1.22 global hectares (gha), respectively), while Slovenia, Egypt and Israel have the lowest (0.63, 0.64 and 0.79 gha, respectively). With the exception of France, all Mediterranean countries rely on the biocapacity of foreign countries to satisfy their residents' demand for food. By analyzing the effect of shifting to a calorie-adequate diet or changing dietary patterns, we finally point out that the region's Ecological Footprint – and therefore its ecological deficit – could be reduced by 8% to 10%.
The food system is increasingly acknowledged as the single largest reason for humans' transgression of key planetary limits and it is gaining centrality in our societal run-up towards a sustainable future, especially at city level. In Portugal, a country characterized by high meat and fish consumption, noticeable food wastage, and high urbanization level, fully understanding and then transforming the food system is of priority. Here we investigate the significance of food in comparison to other daily anthropogenic demands and the current sourcing and resource intensities profiles of dietary patterns at Portuguese national and city level through Ecological Footprint Accounting. A critical assessment of gaps in national and local food policies to trigger a major transformation in the Portuguese food system is also conducted on the basis of a newly proposed analytical framework. Results show that food consumption in Portugal is the single largest reason (≈30%) for transgressing the carrying capacity of Earth ecosystems but, despite the urgent need for changes in Portuguese food systems, major deficiencies in local policy implementation exist with weak policy commitment, coordination, and lacking institutional capacity as food policies - especially at the local level - are still not prioritized. Similarities with other countries within Europe and their implications are also discussed.
Seafood is central to the diet of Mediterranean inhabitants. However, there is high consumer demand for certain species whose populations are rapidly declining in the Mediterranean Sea. Diversifying regional seafood preferences has the potential to reduce pressure on marine ecosystems while supporting local fishing economies. Here, we explored this opportunity through case studies in three Mediterranean countries: Croatia, Italy, and Turkey. First, we conducted an Ecological Footprint Analysis (EFA) to quantify the environmental impact of each country's food consumption choices. Then, we distributed a seafood consumer survey to understand each country's dietary preferences and residents' overall willingness to change their diets, with a specific focus on products from Small-Scale Fisheries (SSF). We found food consumption to be the primary Ecological Footprint driver in all three countries, with a contribution from the consumption of fish and seafood ranging from 6% (Turkey) to 11% (Italy) of each country's food Footprint. Results from the consumer survey showed that dietary preferences were unique to each culture. For example, consumers in Italy and Turkey were more willing to modify their diets than residents surveyed in Croatia. Across all three countries, consumers who are more aware of product labels, origin, and freshness of seafood products were more willing to purchase diverse seafood products. To diversify seafood consumption choices, particularly away from high trophic level species, consumer awareness campaigns should be tailored to meet the preferences of each unique culture in the Mediterranean. A broader Pan-Mediterranean study of culturally-unique consumer attitudes is warranted to accelerate progress towards sustainable seafood consumption in the region that benefits both biodiversity and local fishing economies.
Tourism represents a key economic sector worldwide, constituting great leverage for local economic development but also putting noticeable environmental pressures on local natural resources. Ecotourism may be a viable alternative to mass tourism to minimize impacts on ecosystems, but it needs shared sustainability standards and monitoring tools to evaluate impacts. This paper presents a first methodological proposition to calculate the environmental impact of ecotourism packages through the use of an ad-hoc, customized version of the Ecological Footprint methodology. It follows a participatory, bottom-up approach to collecting input data for the four main services (Accommodation, Food & Drinks, Activity & Service, and Mobility & Transfer) provided to tourists through the use of surveys and stakeholders engagement. The outcome of our approach materializes in an excel-based ecotourism workbook capable of processing input data collected through surveys and returning Ecological Footprint values for specific ecotourism packages. Although applied to ecotourism in Mediterranean Protected Areas within the context of the DestiMED project, we believe that the methodology and approach presented here can constitute a blueprint and a benchmark for future studies dealing with the impact of ecotourism packages.
Contemporary socio-environmental problems such as the reduced availability of natural resources, the loss of biodiversity, soil degradation, pollution, an unprecedented population growth, the mass migration of people to cities, and urban sprawl may be associated with the consequences of an economic infinite growth paradigm on a finite planet. Despite international goals for improving the spatial and environmental management, current and future developments are continuously planned without the consideration of the biophysical limits to growth. This could be equated with the environmental carrying capacity (ECC), a concept and a tool for the sustainable development of human settlements. This research use the environmental indicators such as Ecological Footprint (EF) and biocapacity (BC) for ECC quantification. Despite EF and BC accounting is well-developed at the global, national and regional levels, there is still lack of local - urban standard for EF assessment. Therefore, the main goal of this study is to present the local approach for EF assessment and its potential to use for ECC assessment at local (i.e., city) level. The study compares the hybrid EF, which joined the bottom-up CF with the remaining EF's components from a top-down approach, with the standard top-down EF approach. In this study, the assessment focused mainly on household consumption which could be equated as main driver responsible for Ecological Footprint. Thus, the impact of household consumption was quantified according to four categories reflecting resources' use and waste generation as: Food, Housing, Mobility, Services and Goods. The analysis of ECC was conducted for the Polish city of Wrocław in Central Eastern Europe for the year 2016. The results showed, that the city of Wrocław exceeds its ECC. Both calculations were affected by data limitations, and likely represent overestimation of the EF. The proposed approach could be important for ECC assessment, quantification of the EF of human activities, and more sustainable spatial management of the city.
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