生态足迹核算和批评

Large media exposure invariably kindles critical voices. Ecological Footprint accounting and its Earth Overshoot Day are no exception. This is healthy and welcome.

地球过冲2019日产生的5000多基于Web的故事，其中包括GreenBiz评论凯文自施耐德电气。Two of them contested the validity of Ecological Footprint results, including another GreenBiz article,“Resource depletion is a serious problem, but 'footprint' estimates don't tell us much about it."

We respond to this latter one, first in general and then with examples.

生态足迹和生物承载力的会计，是一个不断发展的学科，从批评和新鲜的观点利润。有些批评是基于误解或混淆，在一些新的见解和逻辑论证。它们有助于推进生态足迹方法，提高结果传达的方式和锐化工具的应用。

Criticism of any assessment becomes sound and meaningful when it includes answers to at least four questions.

任何评估，其中包括生态足迹核算，批评的声音变得和有意义的，当它包括回答至少四个基本的，连续的问题：

1. 是否明确定义的，可检验的研究问题进行评估构建？
2. If yes, is the research question relevant to the intended audiences?
3. If yes, are more accurate methods available elsewhere for answering this particular research question?
4. 如果没有，是社会最好没有这种方法产生的结果？

通过following such a logical analytical line, criticism becomes sharp and helpful.

例如，最近在GreenBiz文章总结说，“该方法[生态足迹账户是概念性地存在缺陷，在任何科学或政策方面几乎无法使用。”Yet the article lacks arguments to make that case: It does not identify the actual research question 1, hence cannot meaningfully discuss the methods validity nor the metric’s relevance or lack thereof, nor does it identify a better way of measuring, as identified by question 3.

Such undefined criticisms become based on unrelated premises and end up discussing issues outside of the research scope of what they scrutinize, in this case Ecological Footprint accounts.

什么是生态足迹实际测量？

生态足迹账户are designed to answer the following question: How much of our planet’s (or any region’s) regenerative capacity does any human activity demand?

生态足迹账户answer this question by contrasting two estimates: the availability of biocapacity; and the human demand on biocapacity, called the Ecological Footprint.

The Ecological Footprint represents all the mutually exclusive, biologically productive spaces that human activity demands. The Ecological Footprint of a person to satisfy his or her consumption includes demands for food, fiber, timber, space occupied for built infrastructure and the space required to assimilate waste, including emissions from burning fossil fuels. Currently, the most significant component of humanity’s Ecological Footprint is the carbon footprint.

Because of the two sides of the accounts, one can contrast human demand with biocapacity. Demand on regeneration as well as regenerative capacity are both expressed in biologically productive areas. To make areas comparable across the world and across various land-use types, areas are expressed in "global hectares" which represent world average productivity.

我们看到这个评估作为可持续性，竞争力和长期的福祉密切相关。竞彩足球app怎么下载

We see this assessment as highly relevant for sustainability, competitiveness and long-term well-being, because living within the regenerative capacity of the Earth’s ecosystems is a necessary (although not sufficient) condition for human long-term success. And, as Ecological Footprint accounting demonstrates, we are failing to meet this condition by a long shot.

不过，与任何指标，生态足迹具有明显的局限性。这些更详细地对论文鉴定方法，resultsor应用，or in the upcoming book“Ecological Footprint: Managing our Biocapacity Budget."Limitations of the metric include:

• 这不是可持续发展的一个完整的度量。竞彩足球app怎么下载They only capture the key, minimum necessary condition for sustainability: to what extent overall human demand is within the regenerative capacity of our planet. Other dimensions, such as human well-being or environmental quality, are also important sustainability issues yet are not captured by the accounts.
• 它衡量总再生和需求。这些成果的措施;换言之，一个生态系统的再生是结果或土壤，水可用性，生物多样性和许多其它因素的当前状态的结果。生态足迹帐户不提供这些可持续性因素的具体指标，但两者的因素和结果的关键信息在解决多方面的问题，如可持续发展。竞彩足球app怎么下载
• 它不预测。生态足迹账户只跟踪实际的活动，因为任何簿记一样。他们只是记录输入和输出，因为它们是和不提供外推，以多少生物承载力可能会在未来的人类活动被耗尽。
• 它最有可能低估了全球超调。各国生态足迹账户是严格根据联合国的统计数据。这些统计数据可能不包括所有消费项目，以及生物承载力数据基于这些统计数据可能高估了长期的生产力，因为森林砍伐，土壤流失或对未来生产力水资源短缺的影响尚未捕获。该GreenBiz文章指出了这一点为好，我们同意。）

误解的例子

为了说明混淆，我们讨论的文章许多误解的三个例子：

• “生态足迹为印尼人均1.7全球公顷，所有国家的30％最低之一。但根据2014研究，印度尼西亚拥有世界上最高的毁林率。”
  
  森林砍伐肯定is reflected in the accounts, but not by looking at per-capita Ecological Footprint of consumption. If forest products in Indonesia are exported, the footprint of these products would appear in the country of the consumer, and not counted in Indonesia’s footprint. Additionally, a per-capita measure does not correlate with a total impact — you would need to multiply this by total people. Whether Indonesia’s per-capita footprint ranks in the lowest 30 percent among all countries is irrelevant for assessing the potential for deforestation. What matters is how big its Ecological Footprint is compared to its biocapacity.
  
  
• “足迹计算不考虑自然资源的库存是否下降，还是人类消费的结果增加。这个问题对于理解生态影响的关键。“
  
  我们同意这是一个关键问题。但生态足迹账户只是衡量再生需求（即流​​），股票是否不增加或没有。两者都是重要的。在金融世界中，有损益表和资产负债表。没有人会指责的利润表不包括资产负债表。这些都是独立的和重要的问题。
  
  
• “这些国家的生态足迹计算也混为一谈可持续发展与自给自足。竞彩足球app怎么下载他们认为，每个国家应该产生所有它占用的资源，尽管它可能是成本更低的国家进口一些商品比在国内生产它们。”
  
  该账户只描述，他们不混为一谈。该账户只描述，他们不混为一谈。他们只是衡量和比较的消费和生产的脚印与全局或局部生物承载力。他们指出，逻辑必然性：并非所有国家可生物承载力债务人很长时间。反之亦然，足迹账户从来没有要求所有国家必须自给自足的资源。

所引用的文章突破的误解进行了讨论here。

Deeper in the red

In essence, we agree that criticism is important and needed. For this reason, we had the National Footprint and Biocapacity Accounts tested bymore than 10 national governments和那些重现的结果能的原创性成果的3〜4％的幅度内做到这一点。

它不是基于实际值和批评缺乏有关研究问题，评估只解决增加了混乱的清晰度。我们关注的是，这样的虚假陈述行为只有在大量的挑战需要清晰和成功每个人的最大努力增加全球熵。

The bottom-line conditions for sustainability are straightforward. While sustainability can’t and shouldn’t be defined by a single number, it is still necessary that human demand be within the regenerative capacity of the planet if we do not want to jeopardize humanity’s future.

生态足迹和生物承载力帐户是类似于一个企业的损益表。作为一个在黑是一个必要条件，但维持一个长期的业务大约是这么多。

通过our measure, humanity has been getting deeper into the red every year.