Earth Overshoot Day marks the date when humanity’s demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. The day is computed by dividing the planet’s biocapacity (the amount of ecological resources Earth is able to generate that year), by humanity’s ecological footprint (humanity’s demand for that year), and multiplying by the number of days in a year.
In 2021, Earth Overshoot Day fell on July 29 – the average of the overshoot days of all individual countries across the globe. While the average of 2022 has yet to be calculated, the data of certain countries has been released and the results are not looking too good. It’s likely to be early July.
New Zealand’s overshoot day fell on April 19th, about the 15th earliest. Read more about Earth Overshoot day
That essentially means if every country lived and used resources as NZ does we’d need three planet earths. It’s a good way to put things into perspective when we often are made to feel as though NZ is a leader in this space. Most countries have work to do with many European countries having their overshoot day in May. But either way the data is obvious: our collective use of earth’s resources is far beyond what it can replenish in a given year, and we must act quickly to reverse this imbalance.
Let’s #movethedate of Earth overshoot day. One way you can do that is to move your money. Take action and use our #divestthedirt tool here.
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