Think Tank Says Morocco Consumes Natural Resources Below Global Average

Rabat – By July 28, humanity had consumed all natural resources that Earth can sustainably regenerate that year, according to American think tank Ecological Footprint Network. The date is referred to as “Earth Overshoot Day,“ and intends to show the massive unsustainable overexploitation of the world’s resources.

However, the think tank says if all humanity consumed natural resources at a similar rate as Moroccans, this overshoot day would be pushed to November 26. Still, the North African country is facing serious ecological crises such as water scarcity and pollution that call for urgent action.

Explaining the concept of Earth Overshoot Day, Mathis Wackernagel, Founder of Global Footprint Network told DW that “It’s like if you spent all your money by July 28, and then the year you live off deficit spending.”

He added, “It’s actually even more serious because with money, you can print or borrow it. With resources, we can borrow from the future as well, but we cannot print them.”

Earth Overshoot Day is calculated by dividing the earth’s biocapacity by humanity’s ecological footprint, which measures the environmental impact of global demand for plant-based food and livestock and fish products. The calculated total is then multiplied by 365, the number of days in a year.

To address resource deficiencies, humanity works on liquidating stocks of ecological resources and accumulating waste, leading to the consumption of 1.75 times the resources than the earth can regenerate. And this comes at the expense of future generations.

“We look at all the problems in separate ways — climate change or biodiversity loss or food shortage — as if they were occurring independently,” Wackernagel told DW, stressing that these phenomena are “all symptoms of the same underlying theme: that our collective metabolism, the amount of things that humanity uses, has become very big compared to what Earth can renew.”

In April, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned of a “disastrous” acceleration in global warming indicators which would lead to more than double the 1.5 degree threshold by 2100.

This change translates to major heat waves, floods, storms, water shortages, and the extinction of 1 million species, the panel explained in a report titled “Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change.”

This summer, numerous countries have experienced unprecedented heat waves, raising concerns about the growing consequences of the climate crisis.

Extreme temperatures – 1.6ºC above average – were recorded in Spain, France, and Italy as the continent experienced its second warmest June on record. The heatwaves extended to North Africa, the Middle East, Central Africa, Antarctica, Canada, Japan, and China.

Heatwaves mixed with high humidity in Saudi Arabia are also expected to make Hajj dangerous and unbearable under increasingly extreme climate conditions.

Climate-driven migration is another byproduct of the climate crisis which is set to define this century. A Guardian article, published on August 18, argued that large populations will be moving across the continent towards Northern countries to live in “more tolerable conditions.” This trend is expected to put additional pressure on countries in northern latitudes, as they will have to accommodate millions of migrants while addressing their domestic climate crises.