Authorities released Tuesday a report that can help generate informed choices on management and use of Philippine natural assets to truly promote sustainable development amidst climate change.
The report “A Measure for Resilience” acknowledges the Philippines’ development gains over time but warns these can be reversed if gap between the country’s ecological footprint and biocapacity continues widening.
“We can’t afford to have a footprint larger than our biocapacity,” Climate Change Commission Commissioner Naderev Saño said at launching of the report his agency collaborated with the Global Footprint Network and Agence Francaise de Developpement.
Ecological footprint represents the “area of biologicallyproductive land and water a population requires to provide resources it consumes and to absorb its waste using prevailing technology,” the Global Footprint Network noted.
“Such footprint measures humanity’s demand on nature,” it said.
Experts reported that an average Philippine resident’s ecological footprint in 2008 was 1.3 global hectares (gha).
The report noted that biocapacity represents the biosphere’s ability to produce crops, livestock, timber products and fish as well as to uptake carbon dioxide in forests.
“It measures ability of available terrestrial and aquatic areas to provide ecological resources and services,” it said.
Biocapacity available per person in the Philippines in 2008 was only 0.6 gha, it said.
Citing available data, Saño noted the Philippines already breached its biocapacity as early as the 1960s.
“Our country’s been in ecological deficit since then,” he said, adding that such deficit has been increasing ever since.
“That’s over-spending,” he said.
However, Saño clarified that such over-spending can only go on for so long until signs of collapse become undeniably clear.
“We can’t live beyond ecological limits,” he said.
‘A Measure for Resilience’ noted over-spending prevailed to such extent that by 2008, people nationwide were already using over two times the country’s capacity to provide biological resources and to absorb CO2 emissions.
“The nation demanded more than twice what it had in available capacity,” the report said.
Such situation compounded climate change threats and other challenges to the country’s bid for sustainable development, it added.
Experts noted that sustainable development is human development that is within the biosphere’s ecological limits.
The report explores three future scenarios for the Philippines.
Under the business-as-usual scenario, which assumes high economic growth and population increase in line with UN estimates, average Philippine footprint is projected to grow from 1.3 to 1.7 gha per capita by 2050 when available global biocapacity is estimated at 1.3 gha.
For the slower economic growth scenario, the country’s average ecological footprint is projected to grow at least 1.5 gha per capita.
A scenario of high economic growth but reduced population increase suggests a possible footprint of 1.7 gha per capita but without additional pressure on domestic ecosystems.
“All three scenarios show an ecological deficit continuing in the Philippines for decades to come,” the report concluded.
Saño believes that such trend can be changed if the country truly pursues sustainable development and not progress at the expense of natural assets nationwide.
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