Current Status

Introduced in the early 1990s, Ecological Footprint accounts continue to be the only metric in the world that can compare overall human demand on nature against what our planet can renew. Since 2003, Global Footprint Network has been maintaining and publishing National Footprint & Biocapacity Accounts for countries. They cover all countries from 1961 to today, based on UN statistics. The latest accounts document that humanity’s total demand now exceeds what the planet can renew by over 60%.

 

Why FoDaFo was founded

Global Footprint Network and the Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University, Toronto, are building its next incarnation to increase reach and impact. The goal is to build a coalition of countries, supported by a rigorous global academic network, that owns and produces the National Footprint & Biocapacity Accounts independently and with highest reliability, so they can inform decision-making in an unbiased way. For this purpose, they are creating a not-for-profit called the Footprint Data Foundation (FoDaFO) to be the stewards of these National Footprint & Biocapacity Accounts (NFAs), and to reproduce them with the support of York University and a broader academic network.