28 September, 2022 |

Environment

What is Earth Overshoot Day?

Through this blog, we wanted to make you understand what "Earth Overshoot Day" is all about and its consequences that threaten us and most importantly, our future generations. Let's get started :)

Introduction Let me ask you a question. Where does the river get its water from? You may answer the source destination, but how is it formed at the source? Well, that is the beauty of our mother nature. Our planet can usually regenerate biological resources every year. But the irony is that we over-utilise our resources, leading to an overshoot. Let me explain the concept of overshooting with a simple and relevant example; Person X is earning 10000 Rupees a month and has already spent the entire money before the month ends, due to which he happened to borrow money to survive for the rest of the month. This situation he is currently in is called "Overshoot".

What is EOD & how is it calculated? Earth Overshoot Day is central to the science of sustainability. It is when our demand for our natural resources exceeds the supply. It is calculated by dividing the number of natural resources that the Earth produces every year or biocapacity by the number of natural resources that human beings use on Ecological footprint all of that times by 365/366 for the number of days in the year.

What is Ecological Footprint? It is all the ecological assets in hectares that a population needs to produce the natural resources. It consumes 1) Forest land for timber and to absorb carbon emissions, 2) Crops and Grazing Land for rearing animals and growing plants, 3) Built up land for homes, and 4)Fishing Grounds for seafood.

When is the Overshoot Day? Earth Overshoot Day is no specific day (unlike Birthdays and Marriage Anniversaries); it keeps changing every year. And the irony is it is not something that is meant to celebrate but a day to introspect, reflect and do the needful to preserve and conserve the planet. And the day is going to be different for different countries. Since Overshoot Day was first calculated over a decade ago, it started to fall earlier and earlier in the year. It used to be in October back then, but we are usually witnessing it at the beginning of August in recent times.

Who are the culprits? They are none other than the developed countries as they are the ones who are the significant contributors to Climate Change, and the developing and underdeveloped nations suffer the Environmental Impact due to the developed countries. Overfishing, Overfarming, and Overemitting more carbon dioxide than the forest can process will likely bring us nothing less harm. It is altering the natural balance, and we live way beyond our ecological means.

What can we do to fix this? You always got to remember that it is better late than never. We must give enough importance to the environment, just like we offer to our mothers and fathers. We must offer gratitude to our planet for its efforts to regenerate resources for our sake (Look how generous the earth is). Look, we can never dare to dominate nature or get ready to face the consequences.

Article by Krishna Teja Reddy and Picture sourced from Unsplash Did you love this blog? If you want to keep learning and exploring something new daily and don't have much time, simply subscribe to us as I promise you a 4 min read daily in simple English. Don't forget to share it with your friends and family. Until then, this is krishna signing off :)

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