Global Material Flows and Resource Productivity

| August 3, 2016 | Leave a Comment

Item Link: Access the Resource

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Year of Publication: 2016

Publication City: Paris, France

Publisher: United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)

Author(s): Heinz Schandl, Marina Fischer-Kowalski, James West, Stefan Giljum, Monika Dittrich, Nina Eisenmenger, Arne Geschke, Mirko Lieber, Hanspeter Wieland, Anke Schaffartzik, Fridolin Krausmann, Sylvia Gierlinger, Karin Hosking, Manfred Lenzen, Hiroki Tanikawa, Alessio Miatto, Tomer Fishman

Assessment Report for the UNEP International Resource Panel

The International Resource Panel presents a comprehensive data set and report of material use and movement in the global economy. The Panel pays particular attention to the prospect of decoupling economic growth and human well-being from ever-increasing use of natural resources and related environmental impact.

With this report, the Working Group on Global Material Flows of the International Resource Panel provides, for the first time, a comprehensive and harmonized data set of material use and movement in the global economy for the past 40 years. Based on this solid data set, it analyses status, trends, structure and dynamics of resource use, including extraction, trade and consumption of biomass, fossil fuels, metal ores and non-metallic minerals. The report finds that global material use has tripled over the past four decades, with annual global extraction of materials growing from 22 billion tonnes (1970) to 70 billion tonnes (2010).

The report also provides a new material footprint indicator, reporting the amount of materials that are required for final consumption, which sheds light on the true impact of economies. By relating global supply chains to final demand for resources, the indicator is a good proxy for the average material standard of living in a country. It indicates that the level of development and well-being in wealthy industrial countries has been achieved largely through highly resource-intensive patterns of consumption and production, which are not sustainable, even less replicable to other parts of the world.

The material intensity of the world economy has been increasing for the past decade, driven by the great acceleration that has occurred since the year 2000. Globally, more material per unit of GDP is now required

The richest countries consume on average 10 times as many materials as the poorest countries, and twice the world average, which demonstrates very unequal distribution of materials to support the standard of living. It shows that the low income group of countries will require increasing quantities of materials, per capita, to achieve the sustainable development outcomes the global community aims for.

The outlook is for further growth in material use if countries successfully improve economic and human development, and are able to raise living standards and combat poverty. Assuming that the world will implement similar systems of production and systems of provision for major services – housing, mobility, food, energy and water supply – nine billion people will require 180 billion tonnes of materials by 2050, almost three times today’s amounts.

Rising material use will result in climate change, higher levels of acidification and eutrophication of soils and water bodies, increased biodiversity loss, more soil erosion and increasing amounts of waste and air pollution. It will also have negative impacts on human health and quality of life. It will ultimately lead to the depletion of certain natural resources and will cause supply shortages for critical materials in the short and medium terms.

Download the full report and read Alex Kirby’s summary of the report via EcoWatch.

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