National Ecological Deficit Accounting of China with Detailed Ecological Footprint

Ecological footprint is a new method to assess sustainable development quantitatively. It translates production into biologically productive areas offering material flows to measure the utilized degree of nature by humankind. At present, China runs ecological deficits because footprints required for consumption are larger than available ones. In the paper, the ecological footprint model is applied to calculate the deficits by resource, environment and import-export accounting. It is clear that the deficits have caused enormous pressure to resource and environment, which would become bigger with more factors of resource and environment being accounted. In the primary production and energy trade, import footprint turned from deficit to surplus after 1996, which benefited the conservation of national resource. But compared with the huge depletion caused by resource and environment, they had small effects on deficits.