Giving Compass' Take:
- Writing for Eco-Business, Ayesha Tandon discusses how emissions are disproportionately created by people in wealthier nations.
- Why do the ultra-wealthy produce more emissions than those below them in class status?
- Read about lifting people out of extreme poverty.
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The study, published in Nature Sustainability, highlights the global inequality in emissions between people in rich and poor countries. For example, it finds that the average carbon footprint of a person living in sub-Saharan Africa is 0.6 tonnes of carbon dioxide (tCO2). Meanwhile, the average US citizen produces 14.5tCO2 per year.
The authors find that the average carbon footprint in the top 1 per cent of emitters was more than 75-times higher than that in the bottom 50 per cent.
“The inequality is just insane,” the lead author of the study tells Carbon Brief. “If we want to reduce our carbon emissions, we really need to do something about the consumption patterns of the super-rich.”
A scientist not involved in the research says that “we often hear that actions taken in Europe or the US are meaningless when compared to the industrial emissions of China, or the effects of rapid population growth in Africa. This paper exposes these claims as wilfully ignorant, at best”.
Humans release tens of billions of tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. However, the distribution of these emissions is unequal – as they are disproportionately produced by people in wealthier countries who typically live more carbon-intensive lifestyles.
The new study uses what it calls “outstandingly detailed” global expenditure data from the World Bank Consumption Dataset from 2014 to assess the carbon footprints of people in different countries, and with different consumption levels.
Dr Klaus Hubacek is a professor of science, technology and society at the University of Groningen and an author on the study. He tells Carbon Brief what is included in consumption figures:
“Driving the model with the consumption patterns calculates the carbon emissions not only directly through expenditure for heating and cooling, but the embodied carbon emissions in the products they buy. So it’s taking account of the entire global supply chains to calculate those carbon emissions.”
Read the full article about eradicating extreme poverty by Ayesha Tandon at Eco-Business.