Just over four months into the year, Germany has already exceeded sustainable consumption limits for the year, according to the US-based environment NGO Global Footprint Network.

According to its calculations, if everybody in the world behaved like the Germans, humanity would need three Earths to provide enough resources to sustainably accommodate their consumption. 

 

Germany has already exceeded its annual ecological limits     Alistair Walsh

 

So-called overshoot days occur when a country's demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what the planet can regenerate in that year.

The worst offenders, such as Qatar and Luxembourg, already exceeded their limits in February. Other countries, such as Cambodia and Madagascar, will likely stay well below their limits and not overshoot.

Last year, Germany overshot its limit on May 4 — one day later than 2024, taking into account the leap year difference.

 Overshoot Day as a chance to reform

"The German Earth Overshoot Day is a reminder to change the underlying conditions in all sectors now so that sustainable behavior becomes the new normal," Aylin Lehnert, education officer at German environmental NGO Germanwatch, said in a press release. "We need a new debt brake, a debt brake in relation to the overloading of the Earth."

According to Greenwatch, meat production and consumption  in Germany is one of the main drivers of its overuse of Earth's resources. About 60% of its agricultural land is used for animal feed production, and millions of tons are imported from overseas. 

Germany's total imports led to the destruction of 138,000 hectares of tropical forest worldwide from 2016 to 2018, according to the international development agency GIZ.

The Global South, which largely lives within sustainable limits, shoulders much of the burden of overconsumption through environmental destruction and climate change damage.

On Tuesday, Friends of the Earth Germany (BUND) criticized the country's reckless use of soil, water and raw materials.

BUND Chairman Olaf Bandt said in a statement, "Our Earth is overloaded. A country that consumes as many resources as we do is operating poorly and recklessly."

BUND is calling on the German government to introduce a resource protection law for soil and land, arable and pasture land, fishing grounds, ground and surface water, forests and wood.

https://www.dw.com/en/germany-has-already-exceeded-its-annual-ecological-limits/a-68964065

 

FREE JULIAN ASSANGE NOW..............