Ecological Footprint and Environmental Sustainability Index: Instruments of Measuring Sustainable Development Case Study: Sustainability of Shandong (China)

Our escalating consumption of natural products and services directly impacts the planet. The challenge is to ensure that our needs are not exceeding the ecological capacity of the biosphere. But how to know if they do so? To answer this question and assess the human impact on nature, Wackernagel and Rees have developed Ecological Footprint that can measure how much natural capital we use to sustain our lifestyles and how much capital nature can provide us. On the other hand, to be able to present in a single measure for each economy and to focus strictly on the environmental issues, World Economic Forum (WEF) developed Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI). The ESI creates a series of comparative benchmarks of environmental decision-making onto a more fact ? based and analytical function. This book analyzes the current situation of sustainable development indicators and discusses the concepts of the EF and the ESI and explores the application of the EF and ESI to the regional level by Case Study: Sustainability of Shandong. EF and ESI is an essential addition to the study and management of reginal to be sustainable.