Humans
are stripping nature at an unprecedented rate
and will need two planets' worth of natural
resources every year by 2050 on current trends,
the WWF conservation group said.
Populations of many species, from fish to
mammals, had fallen by about a third from
1970 to 2003 largely because of human threats
such as pollution, clearing of forests and
overfishing, the group also said in a two-yearly
report.
"For
more than 20 years we have exceeded the earth's
ability to support a consumptive lifestyle
that is unsustainable and we cannot afford
to continue down this path," WWF Director-General
James Leape said, launching the WWF's 2006
Living Planet Report.
"If
everyone around the world lived as those in
America, we would need five planets to support
us," Leape, an American, said in Beijing.
People
in the United Arab Emirates were placing most
stress per capita on the planet ahead of those
in the United States, Finland and Canada,
the report said.
Australia
was also living well beyond its means.
The
average Australian used 6.6 "global" hectares
to support their developed lifestyle, ranking
behind the United States and Canada, but ahead
of the United Kingdom, Russia, China and Japan.
"If
the rest of the world led the kind of lifestyles
we do here in Australia, we would require
three-and-a-half planets to provide the resources
we use and to absorb the waste," said Greg
Bourne, WWF-Australia chief executive officer.
Everyone
would have to change lifestyles -- cutting
use of fossil fuels and improving management
of everything from farming to fisheries.
"As
countries work to improve the well-being of
their people, they risk bypassing the goal
of sustainability," said Leape, speaking in
an energy-efficient building at Beijing's
prestigous Tsinghua University.
"It
is inevitable that this disconnect will eventually
limit the abilities of poor countries to develop
and rich countries to maintain their prosperity,"
he added.
The
report said humans' "ecological footprint"
-- the demand people place on the natural
world -- was 25 percent greater than the planet's
annual ability to provide everything from
food to energy and recycle all human waste
in 2003.
In
the previous report, the 2001 overshoot was
21 percent.
"On
current projections humanity, will be using
two planets' worth of natural resources by
2050 -- if those resources have not run out
by then," the latest report said.
"People
are turning resources into waste faster than
nature can turn waste back into resources."
RISING
POPULATION
"Humanity's
footprint has more than tripled between 1961
and 2003," it said. Consumption has outpaced
a surge in the world's population, to 6.5
billion from 3 billion in 1960. U.N. projections
show a surge to 9 billion people around 2050.
It
said that the footprint from use of fossil
fuels, whose heat-trapping emissions are widely
blamed for pushing up world temperatures,
was the fastest-growing cause of strain.
Leape
said China, home to a fifth of the world's
population and whose economy is booming, was
making the right move in pledging to reduce
its energy consumption by 20 percent over
the next five years.
"Much
will depend on the decisions made by China,
India and other rapidly developing countries,"
he added.
The
WWF report also said that an index tracking
1,300 vetebrate species -- birds, fish, amphibians,
reptiles and mammals -- showed that populations
had fallen for most by about 30 percent because
of factors including a loss of habitats to
farms.
Among
species most under pressure included the swordfish
and the South African Cape vulture. Those
bucking the trend included rising populations
of the Javan rhinoceros and the northern hairy-nosed
wombat in Australia.
