BuaNews (Tshwane)
Vivian Warby
30 October 2008
Cape Town — If humans sustain their current lifestyle, there will be no more land available in 20 years to produce the world's resources.
This is according to the Living Planet Report for 2008 which is published every two years and has become widely accepted as an accurate statement of the earth's ability to retain its functionality integrity as a "living planet".
CEO of World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) South Africa, Dr Morne du Plessis said: "If we continue business as usual we will need two planets by 2030 to keep up with humanity's demand for goods and services."
The footprint of humans on this planet has been growing steadily since the 1960s and by the mid 1980s it was already was way over the planet's carrying capacity.
"Eventually it is going to start biting into the earth's capital," Dr du Plessis warned.
The Ecological Footprint analysis shows that while global biocapacity, or the area available to produce our resources and capture our emissions, is 2.1 global hectares per person, the average individual footprint worldwide is 2.7 global ha per person.
"Thus we are exceeding earth's carrying capacity by about 30 percent on average," he said.
And while South Africa's average footprint sits at 2.1 global hectares, which is slightly lower than the world average, Dr du Plessis, said that while this may seem positive, it does not necessarily indicate that we are living sustainable lifestyles.
"We must bear in mind that there is still a large gap between the rich and the poor in this country and the reality is that this creates a biased perception of individual footprints."
The report also looked at the Living Planet Index which reflects the state of the world's ecosystems.
The LPI of global diversity, as measured by populations of almost 2 000 species of mammal, bird, reptile, amphibians and fish from around the globe, had declined by nearly 30 percent over the period of 1970 to 2005.
Proving that this decline has grown quickly, the 2006 Living Planet Report reported a decline of 20 percent in the Global LPI for 1970 to 2003.
The threats to biodiversity include habitat loss (land been cleared for further development); fragmentation of habitat due to agriculture; over exploitation of species (such as fishing and hunting at commercial levels); pollution (via carbon emissions), the spread of invasive species and climate change.
The water footprint of a country is the total volume of water used to produce the goods and a service consumed by its inhabitants. The latest water footprint measures highlight the significance of water traded in the form of commodities, with for example, a cotton t-shirt which requires 2 900 litres of water in its production.
On average every person consumes, through direct or indirect means, 1.24 million litres of water per year.
South Africa is among the 50 countries currently facing moderate to severe water stress and the number of people suffering from year-round or seasonal water shortages is expected to increase as a result of climate changes, says Dr Deon Nel, WWF Sanlam Living Waters Partnership Manager.
Dr Nel said there were 2.2 billion people living in water stressed catchments and that by 2020 that figure would have doubled due to climate change and socio-economic development.
South Africa, he warned, is facing a water scarcity disaster and by 2025 there could be situation where people do not have enough water to live.
He said government and business must partner to share the risk and responsibility.
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