What are the possibilities for graphical presentation of decoupling? An example of economy-wide material flow indicators in the Czech Republic

Abstract

Abstract The relationship between the environmental and economic domains has attracted researchers and politicians for at least several decades [Boulding, K., 1966. The economics of the coming spaceship earth. In: Boulding. K., et al. (Eds.), Environmental Quality in Growing Economy. Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Marylang; Meadows, D.H., Meadows, D.L., Randers, J., Behrens, W.W., 1972. The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind. Universe Books, New York; Schmidt-Bleek, F., 1994. Wieviel Umwelt Braucht der Mensch? MIPS—Das Mass fur Okologisches Wirtschaften. Birkhauser-Verlag, Berlin, Basel, Boston]. The overall goal of sustainable economies is to reach a state where the general quality of life is growing while the environmental pressures go down [EC, 2001. A Sustainable Europe for a Better World: A European union Strategy for Sustainable Development. Commission of the European Communites, Brussels; EC, 2002. The Sixth Community Environment Action Programme. Commission of the European Communities, Brussels; EC, 2003a. 2003 Environmental Policy Review. Commission of the European Communities, Brussels; EC, 2003b. Towards a thematic strategy on the sustainable use of natural resources. Commission of the European Communities. Brussels; UN, 2002. Plan of Implementation of the World Sunnit on Sustainable Development. United Nations, New York.]. This phenomenon is called decoupling. To express decoupling, one usually aims to capture the mutual relation between an indicator of economic driving forces (most commonly Gross Domestic Product/GDP/, which is usually taken as a proxy of quality of life here) and an indicator of environmental pressure. When analysing decoupling, it is not quite clear how to proceed in terms of both selection of appropriate pressure indicators and presentation of decoupling. In this article, we focus on the issue of graphical presentation of decoupling analysis, particularly using economy-wide material flow indicators (EW-MFI) [Eurostat, 2001. Economy-Wide Material Flow Accounts And Derived Indicators: A Methodological Guide. Eurostat, Luxembourg]. One of the most commonly used methods for graphical presentation of decoupling by EW-MFI is to plot time series of indexed values of these indicators and GDP in a single chart. Here, however, it is difficult or even impossible to analyse causes of the different decoupling for particular indicators—to do this we propose to analyse time series of their components. To show the contribution of the components to the overall decoupling of an indicator, we suggest expressing the weighted share of particular components in overall indicator decoupling. For that we have tested the direct material input indicator (DMI), which is also recommended by OECD for decoupling analysis [OECD, 2002. Indicators to Measure Decoupling of Environmental Pressures from Economic Growth. OECD, Paris]. The expression of the weighted share of the indicator components in indicator decoupling has proved to be especially transparent in the case of this indicator, because the DMI belongs to the least aggregated material flow indicators. Nevertheless, the proposed method of expression can also be applied to other material flow indicators, as exemplified by the domestic material consumption indicator (DMC).