s
ability to sustain life. Humans currently consume 20 percent more
natural resources than the Earth can produce, the report said.
The biggest
consumers of nonrenewable natural resources are the United Arab
Emirates, the United States, Kuwait, Australia and Sweden, who leave the
biggest ecological footprint.
WWF chief
Claude Martin stated that, We are spending nature=s
capital faster than it can regenerate. We are running up an ecological
debt which we won=t
be able to pay off unless governments restore the balance between our
consumption of natural resources and the Earth=s
ability to renew them.
Use of
fossil fuels such as coal, gas and oil increased by almost 700 percent
between 1961 and 2001, the study said.
Populations
of land, freshwater and marine species fell on average by 40 percent
between 1970 and 2000. The report cited urbanization, forest clearance,
pollution, over-fishing and the introduction by humans of nonnative
animals, such as cats and rats, which often drive out indigenous
species.
The question is how the world's
entire population can live with the resources of one planet, said
Jonathan Loh, one of the report's
authors.
