INTRODUCTION WWF-Brasil With the greatest satisfaction we can now present the results of the research undertaken to establish the Ecological Footprint of the city of Campo Grande, the first Brazilian city to carry out such a calculation. The Ecological Footprint of a country, state, city or even of a person corresponds to the amount of productive land and sea needed to produce and sustain a given style of living. It is a way of translating into hectares the territorial expanse that a person or a population or a city, state or country uses, on average, to sustain their ways of eating, dwelling, moving around, taking their leisure and consuming, among others. Today most countries already have the calculation of their ecological footprints available but it can also be done on an individual basis.1 Currently the methodology is being applied in various cities around the world but in Brazil, Campo Grande was the first municipality to adopt the calculation. The partnership established between WWF-Brasil and the Municipal Authority of the capital of the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, the support given by the Global Footprint Network (GFN), the ecoSISTEMAS organization and the University of Anhanguera’s Economic and Social Science Studies and Research Nucleus (NEPES) have all helped to make it possible to conduct this pioneering study in Brazil, namely, the calculation of the Ecological Footprint of a city. The choice of the capital city of the state of Mato Grosso to be the first Brazilian city to apply this methodology was based on certain factors. Campo Grande is the capital city of a Brazilian state that encompasses most of the Pantanal, a region of the greatest importance because of its fantastic environmental richness but at the same time highly threatened by the degradation in course stemming from exaggerated consumption patterns. While it is true that Campo Grande is in the environs of the Pantanal formation and not actually in it, the consumer habits of the city’s residents have effects on the Pantanal just as such choices have on the environment in other parts of Brazil.
1 For a list of countries cf: http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/ footprint_for_nations/
Campo Grande Ecological Footprint p.
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