End of nature’s budget for 2020: We are skidding off nature’s runway!

Thursday, 20 August 2020

Flattening the curve had been an expression that had entered into our lexicon in the past few months. With COVID-19 we have witnessed the drive to flatten the curve and perhaps almost an obsession within governing circles. We compare leaders and there are many to compare and that we do by showcasing different epid curves. 

During April there was the interesting representation of the most desired curve by using two of our New Year delicacies. However, perhaps if you decide by your personal preference for the cookies you may actually select the wrong curve! The usual upper bound of the flattening is taken to be the intensive care bed availability. COVID-19 is perhaps still an extended blip and we must not forget the more important elephant in the room – the climate issue. 

The same flattening of the curve applies in addressing the climate challenge as well. The upper bound in the latter is the temperature rise allowable and Paris agreement got all of us to agree on to a 1.5 degrees Celsius increase. Definitely the seventh coronavirus to hit us – SARS-CoV-2 – had hit us quite hard. The previous six did not push us to the pandemic status but the seventh is having the world reeling from multiple impacts with the death counter still clicking. 

However, the climate issue is much more serious and insidious the difference is the pace of change. Due to this slow rate of change, our majority response had been akin to that of the frog in a bath that failed to react and jump into safety when the temperature is rising slowly and when the situation becomes untenable it is too late. This was quite well demonstrated by Al Gore in his award-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth. 

Too much consumption

Is there even more of an issue facing humanity adding on to climate change? As we read this we may have just witnessed the hottest recorded temperature ever – 54.4 deg. Celsius in Death valley, California. Yet it appears that there is another major issue. 

Every second of our existence there is some form of resource consumption and it is consumption that regulates existence. What is not clear to us at times are what exactly we are consuming and how and all the consequences of our ever expanding consumptive habits. Too much consumption actually threatens the existence and we know that quite well from an individual perspective more than as a collective. 

In developing countries huger is an issue whereas obesity is a killer in the developed world. Due to the urgency of need and the linkages to survival we are not quite interested in some of the natural supply chains we take for granted. A concept that has been introduced in this regard is the calculation of the Earth’s Overshoot Day. This is based on national footprint and bio capacity account.

Earth Overshoot Day

Budgeting is preplanning. At times careful thinking goes into their preparations. Most times we look at what it was in the last year and do quick edits. Then we measure budgeted and actuals over time and either feel elated or get depressed. None of these usual budgets understand what the nature offers to us for a year. 

In normal accounting and economics for a long time we believed that there is infinite capacity with respect to resources on offer and running out of resources was unthinkable. Earth Overshoot Day identifies the day on which we the collective humanity – I mean the humanity only and we do not take the rest of our life’s companions – proceed to exhaust ‘nature’s budget’ for the year. 

An interested group called Global Footprint Network calculates this. Their process is calculating the number of days of that year for which Earth’s bio capacity suffices to provide our ecological footprint. The reminder of the year from that date for the year corresponds to the overshoot. We have a Global Earth Overshoot Day as well as the ability to calculate the same for individual countries. 

A Country Overshoot Day is the date on which Earth Overshoot Day would fall if all of humanity consumed like the people in a particular country. Now there are countries which who actually do not have an Overshoot Day signifying that their citizenry is consuming well within their means. Natural environment is then perfectly able to regenerate what is consumed in the year. Unfortunately today more countries are showing that they do have an Overshoot Day.

Year 2020 – the year of the pandemic – the Overshoot Day falls on 22 August. Interestingly for a change this is an improvement from last year when it landed on 29 July. Of course it is easy to see why. This year for some amount of time we have been forcibly holed inside our homes sparing significant number of consuming activities thus actually having a reduced demand on the eco capacity. Yet compared to 1970 when the concept was originally conceived the calculation gave 29 December. Now even this enforced hibernation has not been as restorative as one can see. Clearly there is a problem ahead of us.

Overconsumption

Our consumption habits when put into quantitative terms means that resources in one planet is not going to be sufficient. This is a situation, which was foreseen by Mahatma Gandhi many a years back at the time of India receiving independence. One of his best quotes had been indicating the impact of greed – "The world has enough for everyone's needs, but not everyone's greed," Mahatma Gandhi. 

Our ‘must-have, must-buy, must be seen with’ economy is eating into the planet's resources like never before, something Gandhi foresaw three-quarters of a century ago. He was well ahead of his time as the concepts of sustainable consumption and production along with development took few more decades to evolve. In another situation upon being asked by the retiring British of his interest in seeing the prosperity in India similar to UK he quipped: “It took Britain half the resources of the planet to achieve this prosperity and going by that reasoning for India more than one planet would be necessary…” He advocated that industrial countries must bring down resource use in their own countries. 

Today this planetary level overconsumption is what we identify with concepts like foot prints and overshoot days. Yet unfortunately the message is falling on deaf ears. For this year 22 August is only a couple of days ahead. Just make a note on how many would be discussing the importance and the relevance. 

What is shown with this year’s Overshoot Day is that the ecological foot print has contracted in some way. This is definitely due to the pandemic slowing down consumption. In analysing data it is clear the carbon dioxide emissions have reduced over the period, which has supported the contraction. Climate change, the big issue, is related to this. 

As you can see the running out of resources is a broader issue – running out of water in places where the need is may happen sooner than the rise in temperature. Thus the three months of lockdowns across nations have only supported the contraction by a little. That also demonstrates the seriousness of our consumptive habits. That is why there is the comment that you need to address the issue by design rather than by disaster as the case was in this period.

If this situation persists one may find as the time moves on that we may even open up the year with the Overshoot Day in January! How can we reverse this situation? We have to reduce our carbon emissions, reduce harvesting from the forest, and reduce demand on food and any particular activity that could impact the global bio capacity. We have to be quite sensitive on all our actions and consider the long-term consequences of our activities. 

When seeing the virus impact fading we appear to be itching to get back into the normal and even perhaps catching back on lost consumption. This is indeed a sad scenario to pay witness to. A few enlightened individuals have come together to identify and develop this type of phrases with a meaning for the rest of us to learn from. Think deep and understand – ignore these and we really ignore these at peril.

You may also wonder where Sri Lanka is as the country overshoot days are given in the figure. I thought why not kindle the curiosity and the more committed to search for that answer as there is value in homework to a newspaper reader as well!