trends and future of sustainable development - TransEco

As can be seen from figure 4 the exported material flows have increased in period from 1980 to2007. However, as the direct flows have doubled, have the related hidden flows grown even far faster. Inthis period they have grown almost 2.5 -fold. Thus the structure of Finnish exports have changed andincludes now more hidden flows than ever. The question about dynamics of hidden flow multipliers iscentral challenge in compiling hidden flow accounts also in other EU member countries. Since theecological rucksacks tend to change over the years, the development of the HF’s should be taken intoconsideration in MFA accounts. The HF multipliers of import and export flows should also be countryspecific,since the ecological rucksacks of same direct material flows varies a lot between differentcountries.7. Development of MFA aggregate indicators In FinlandGenerally DMI and DMC are regarded good indicators as the data behind them is quite reliable. As thehidden flow data availability is limited and statistical methods used in their calculation are quite robust,the most comprehensive MFA indicators, TMR and TMC are in many cases the weakest indicators. Thedevelopment of Finnish DMI and TMR from 1945 to 2007 is described in figure 5.50040030020010001945 1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005DMI TMRFigure 5.Development of Finnish DMI and TMR -measures in 1945 – 2007 (Million tonnes)In 1945 the Finnish DMI was some 29.4 million tonnes whereas in 2007 it was over 250.6 milliontonnes. Likewise the TMR has grown from 51.2 million tonnes to 407.3 million tonnes during the sameperiod. The trends of both indicators have been constantly growing with no indication ofdematerialization or immaterialisation processes.8. Development of Eco-efficiency of the Finnish economyThe concept of Eco-efficiency was first presented by Schaltegger and Sturm in 1990 and was laterpopularised by Schmidheiny and the Business Council for Sustainable Development (BCSD). Thetheoretical background to Eco-efficiency comes from ecological economics, especially the idea of athroughput economy presented earlier by Boulding, Daly, Ayres and Simonis. Eco-efficiency seeks tocombine economic efficiency and the material efficiency of production with the objectives of sustainabledevelopment and the notion of social justice under a single heading. At a general level combining these83