As of May 23rd, Serbia had used up its natural resources reserves for this year, which means that from today on, we are “living on borrowed resources.”
This is the assessment of the research organization Global Footprint Network, which calculates every year to try to determine with the greatest possible precision when a country will use up its natural resources.
The day when a country exhausts its natural resources is calculated by multiplying the number of days in a year (366 for 2024) by the difference between the global hectare per capita and the country’s biocapacity.
Biocapacity is the ability of ecosystems to produce the resources we use and absorb waste materials produced by humans, while the global hectare defines a country’s productivity per capita.
According to WWF Adria, Serbia entered ecological debt on July 8 last year, and this year, that day came much earlier.
“The explanation for Serbia’s ecological debt rising suddenly lies in the most important factor in this formula – that is the country’s population”, explained Dunja Mazzocco Drvar, Director of the Nature Conservation Programme at WWF Adria.
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According to her, the global hectare per capita is determined based on a country’s population and the smaller the population, the greater the ecological debt.
“The population census in Serbia in 2022 showed a declining number of inhabitants compared to earlier censuses, so the debt was incurred earlier. Of course, this does not mean we should carelessly accept this step back. On the contrary, now more than ever, we need to take action to preserve what nature has given us”, said Ms Mazzocco Drvar.
Regarding the countries in the region, Slovenia used up its resources on April 25, Bosnia and Herzegovina on May 9, Croatia on May 28 and Montenegro on May 30. The first on this year’s list of countries entering environmental debt is Qatar, which used up its resources on February 11, while the last is Kyrgyzstan, which will have used up its natural resources on December 30.
Energy Portal
