South Africa can address its ever-increasing ecological footprint by looking at its commodities holistically, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF SA) said on Tuesday.
“We need a more integrated view of our landscapes,” Deon Nel, head of the consevation body’s biodiversity unit, said at the release of the latest edition of its Living Planet Report in Cape Town. “The food, water and energy nexus becomes very important in our thinking.” Mr Nel said ministers should work together to create an intelligent plan of how land would provide for a growing population. Water scarcity, for example, should be addressed by taking into account the bigger picture of protecting the land from which the water was sourced. “Fifty percent of our water is generated from 12% of our land capacity,” he said. “We should be putting all our resources into securing that 12%.” Described as a “nerve point” by Mr Nel, water scarcity is a harsh reality, with the new report showing that large parts of South Africa go at least two to three months without normal water levels. He called on the government’s National Planning Commission to play a more strategic role in the management of environmental resources for future security. Morné du Plessis, CEO of WWF SA, said South Africa’s ecological footprint had increased in the past two years. Each citizen now consumes natural resources equal to 2,59ha, up from 2,32ha in 2010 — less than the global average of 2,7ha, measured in 2008.An ecological footprint is a measure of how much biologically productive land and water people need to absorb their waste and produce the resources they consume.
The biggest component of South Africa’s footprint is the amount of land needed to offset carbon emissions. The country has an overreliance on fossil fuels, burning mostly coal for electricity. Carbon offsets are also the biggest component of the global ecological footprint at 55%, followed by croplands. In Africa, the three countries with the biggest footprints are Mauritius, Mauritania and Botswana. South Africa is in fourth position. The countries with the biggest footprints in the world are Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. A new analysis of consumption trends in Brazil, Russia, India, Indonesia, China and South Africa shows rapid economic growth, with a per capita footprint increase of 65% since 1961. The WWF report highlights that these countries are expanding more rapidly than high-income countries and therefore face sustainability challenges. Mr du Plessis said the globe was consuming much quicker than it was producing. “We are living as if we have an extra planet at our disposal. We are using 50% more resources than the Earth can sustainably produce, and unless we change course … by 2030, even two planets will not be enough.” The conservation body said the future of the globe could be managed by preserving natural capital, creating better production systems, consuming natural resources more wisely, redirecting finances to conservation efforts and sharing available resources.
