Newsletter Earth Overshoot Day 2008 - Footprint Network News

Newsletter Earth Overshoot Day 2008 - Footprint Network News: "Today is Earth Overshoot Day: the day our demand surpasses nature’s budget On September 23rd this year we mark an unfortunate milestone: As of today, humanity will have consumed all the new resources the planet will produce this year, according to Global Footprint Network calculations. For the rest of 2008, we will be in the ecological equivalent of deficit depending, drawing down our resource stocks – in essence, borrowing from the future. The recent bank failures in the United States have shown what happens when debt and spending get out of control. We are seeing signs of similarly disastrous consequences from our ecological overspending. Climate change, shrinking forests, declining biodiversity and current world food shortages are all results of the fact that we are demanding more from nature than it can supply. Humans now require the resources of 1.4 planets Just like any company nature has a budget – it can only produce so many resources and absorb so much waste each year. Globally, we now demand the biological capacity of 1.4 planets, according to Global Footprint Network data. But of course, we only have one. Earth Overshoot Day (also known as Ecological Debt Day) was a concept devised by Global Footprint Network partner NEF (New Economics Foundation). Each"