Reply #14: I don't think you understand the concept of the ecological footprint. [View All]

[GliderGuider]

The EF doesn't measure the impact of American consumption on African biocapacity. It measures the impact of a region's consumption on that same region's biocapacity. By that measure, the USA is in much, much worse shape than Africa, with an EF of 9.6 gha and a biocapacity of only 4.7 (as of 2003). Perhaps a better title would have been, "Even Africa is set to exceed its biocapacity." After all, at least Africa still has spare biocapacity, while the world as a whole has long since run out (given a global overshoot of ~40% according to the Footprint of Nations report PDF).