overconsumption--2009

5. Consumption of resourcesThere are huge differences in per capita consumption of natural resources between differentcountries and world regions. People in rich countries consume up to 10 times more naturalresources than those in the poorest countries. The most resource-intensive areas of life in Europeare housing, food and transport. These three areas make up around 70% of our total resourceconsumption.Global resource consumption equals global resourceextraction: the world economy uses around 60 billiontonnes of resources each year to produce the goods andservices which we all consume.Large differences in per capita consumption. In Europe,around 36 kg of resources are extracted per person perday, excluding the unused resource extraction, whereas 43kg are consumed per person per day (see Figure 9). Europeanstherefore need resources imported from other worldregions to maintain their level of consumption.Consumption is even higher in other world regions. Anaverage North American consumes around 90 kg per day;inhabitants in Oceania about 100 kg per day. On average,in comparison to Europe, people in these continents haveFigure 9: Consumption of resources per capita per day, 2000 (ix)884314EuropeAsiaNorth America34Latin America14,40kg/Day10Africa100Oceania1 Full Rucksack 15 kg of Resource Consumption Per Capita and Day—20 | OVERCONSUMPTION? Our use of the world’s natural resources