Also referred to as environmental footprint, ecological footprint refers to the environmental resources that a population consumes. Measurement of ecological footprint enables estimation of the requirements of a specific population or economy on the consumption of resources and assimilation of waste over an area of productive land.(1) This includes use of agricultural and grazing land, fisheries, built-up land, forest areas, and carbon demands on land. Since 2006, the global Earth Overshoot Day marks the day when the annual demand for environmental resources exhausts the resources that can be regenerated that year.(2) In 2019, the Earth Overshoot Day fell on July 29. It should be noted that there are vast differences in ecological footprint between different countries and also between different social groups within countries, which is a reflection of global inequality.
ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT
