June 30th marks the ecological deficit day of India in 2015 . The nation’s demand for food, timber and carbon dioxide absorption now exceeds what the nation’s ecosystems can renew over the full year, according to Global Footprint Network’s 2015 National Footprint Accounts. It would take two Indias to support India residents’ Ecological Footprint.
When a nation like India is in ecological deficit it meets demand by importing, liquidating its own ecological assets and/or using the global commons by emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. See how much nature India has and how much its residents use in the figure below:
Indians consistently have one of the lowest per capita Ecological Footprints in the world, among the lowest 15% of all countries for 2011. The cropland and forest Footprints were the largest components of India’s overall Ecological Footprint until the late 1980s, when the carbon Footprint exceeded the forest Footprint, and the late 2000s, when carbon exceeded the cropland Footprint.
Photo courtesy of Catherine Cunningham/Nature’s Reflection Photography. 20% of net sales from print purchases will be donated to Global Footprint Network with coupon code GFN2015.
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