IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v94y2013icp19-27.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Material use and material efficiency in Latin America and the Caribbean

Author

Listed:
  • West, James
  • Schandl, Heinz

Abstract

Different world regions have followed very different trajectories for natural resources use over the recent decades. Latin America has pursued a development path based largely on exports of primary resources. Adopting this path has characteristic environmental and social impacts. In this paper, we provide the first broad based estimate of material use and material efficiency for the region, beginning in 1970 and extending to the onset of the global financial crisis in 2008. The results show a region with rapidly growing primary materials consumption, which is simultaneously becoming less efficient at converting those resources into national income. Using an IPAT framework, we found that population growth and rising per-capita incomes made comparable contributions to growing material use, while technological change as reflected in material intensity, did not moderate consumption. Increasing materials intensity, observed for the region as a whole, is also observed for most individual countries. This contrasts with some other world regions, and implies that many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean will confront higher environmental pressures than expected when expanding their extractive industries to take advantage of new demand from other world regions, while simultaneously supplying the requirements for their own domestic industrial transformations and urbanization.

Suggested Citation

  • West, James & Schandl, Heinz, 2013. "Material use and material efficiency in Latin America and the Caribbean," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 19-27.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:94:y:2013:i:c:p:19-27
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2013.06.015
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800913002140
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2013.06.015?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Weisz, Helga & Krausmann, Fridolin & Amann, Christof & Eisenmenger, Nina & Erb, Karl-Heinz & Hubacek, Klaus & Fischer-Kowalski, Marina, 2006. "The physical economy of the European Union: Cross-country comparison and determinants of material consumption," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(4), pages 676-698, July.
    2. Fridolin Krausmann & Marina Fischer-Kowalski & Heinz Schandl & Nina Eisenmenger, 2008. "The Global Sociometabolic Transition," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 12(5-6), pages 637-656, October.
    3. Radetzki, Marian, 2006. "The anatomy of three commodity booms," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 56-64, March.
    4. Gonzalez-Martinez, Ana Citlalic & Schandl, Heinz, 2008. "The biophysical perspective of a middle income economy: Material flows in Mexico," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1-2), pages 317-327, December.
    5. Valdes, Constanza, 2011. "Can Brazil Meet the World's Growing Need for Ethanol?," Amber Waves:The Economics of Food, Farming, Natural Resources, and Rural America, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, pages 1-8.
    6. Mr. Sebastian Sosa & Gustavo Adler, 2011. "Commodity Price Cycles: The Perils of Mismanaging the Boom," IMF Working Papers 2011/283, International Monetary Fund.
    7. Branko Milanovic & Shlomo Yitzhak, 2006. "Decomposing World Income Distribution: Does The World Have A Middle Class?," IBT Journal of Business Studies (JBS), Ilma University, Faculty of Management Science, vol. 2(2), pages 88-110.
    8. Vallejo, Maria Cristina, 2010. "Biophysical structure of the Ecuadorian economy, foreign trade, and policy implications," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 159-169, December.
    9. Bartelmus, Peter, 2003. "Dematerialization and capital maintenance: two sides of the sustainability coin," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 61-81, August.
    10. Perez-Rincon, Mario Alejandro, 2006. "Colombian international trade from a physical perspective: Towards an ecological "Prebisch thesis"," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(4), pages 519-529, October.
    11. Heinz Schandl & Nina Eisenmenger, 2006. "Regional Patterns in Global Resource Extraction," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 10(4), pages 133-147, October.
    12. Behrens, Arno & Giljum, Stefan & Kovanda, Jan & Niza, Samuel, 2007. "The material basis of the global economy: Worldwide patterns of natural resource extraction and their implications for sustainable resource use policies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 444-453, December.
    13. Bartelmus, Peter, 2007. "SEEA-2003: Accounting for sustainable development?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(4), pages 613-616, March.
    14. Krausmann, Fridolin & Gingrich, Simone & Eisenmenger, Nina & Erb, Karl-Heinz & Haberl, Helmut & Fischer-Kowalski, Marina, 2009. "Growth in global materials use, GDP and population during the 20th century," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(10), pages 2696-2705, August.
    15. Fridolin Krausmann & Simone Gingrich & Reza Nourbakhch‐Sabet, 2011. "The Metabolic Transition in Japan," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 15(6), pages 877-892, December.
    16. Sylvia Gierlinger & Fridolin Krausmann, 2012. "The Physical Economy of the United States of America," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 16(3), pages 365-377, June.
    17. Pablo Muñoz & Stefan Giljum & Jordi Roca, 2009. "The Raw Material Equivalents of International Trade," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 13(6), pages 881-897, December.
    18. Heinz Schandl & James West, 2012. "Material Flows and Material Productivity in China, Australia, and Japan," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 16(3), pages 352-364, June.
    19. World Bank, 2012. "World Development Indicators 2012," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 6014.
    20. repec:bla:revinw:v:48:y:2002:i:2:p:155-78 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Stefan Giljum, 2004. "Trade, Materials Flows, and Economic Development in the South: The Example of Chile," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 8(1‐2), pages 241-261, January.
    22. Daniela Russi & Ana C. Gonzalez-Martinez & José Carlos Silva-Macher & Stefan Giljum & Joan Martínez-Alier & Maria Cristina Vallejo, 2008. "Material Flows in Latin America," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 12(5-6), pages 704-720, October.
    23. Mario Alejandro Pérez Rincón, 2006. "Colombian international trade from a physical perspective: towards an ecological "Prebisch thesis"," UHE Working papers 2006_03, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Departament d'Economia i Història Econòmica, Unitat d'Història Econòmica.
    24. Andrew F. Reeson & Thomas G. Measham & Karin Hosking, 2012. "Mining activity, income inequality and gender in regional Australia," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 56(2), pages 302-313, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Palacios, Jose-Luis & Calvo, Guiomar & Valero, Alicia & Valero, Antonio, 2018. "The cost of mineral depletion in Latin America: An exergoecology view," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 117-124.
    2. Stefan Bringezu & Janez Potočnik & Heinz Schandl & Yonglong Lu & Anu Ramaswami & Mark Swilling & Sangwon Suh, 2016. "Multi-Scale Governance of Sustainable Natural Resource Use—Challenges and Opportunities for Monitoring and Institutional Development at the National and Global Level," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(8), pages 1-25, August.
    3. Ríos Ocampo, Juan Pablo & Olaya Morales, Yris, 2016. "Sostenibilidad del consumo doméstico de materiales de construcción en Colombia, 1990-2013," Revista Lecturas de Economía, Universidad de Antioquia, CIE, issue 86, pages 127-151, December.
    4. Liliana Lizárraga-Mendiola & Luis D. López-León & Gabriela A. Vázquez-Rodríguez, 2022. "Municipal Solid Waste as a Substitute for Virgin Materials in the Construction Industry: A Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(24), pages 1-20, December.
    5. Mayer, Andreas & Haas, Willi & Wiedenhofer, Dominik, 2017. "How Countries' Resource Use History Matters for Human Well-being – An Investigation of Global Patterns in Cumulative Material Flows from 1950 to 2010," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 1-10.
    6. Yoshida, Keisuke & Fishman, Tomer & Okuoka, Keijiro & Tanikawa, Hiroki, 2017. "Material stock's overburden: Automatic spatial detection and estimation of domestic extraction and hidden material flows," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 165-175.
    7. Thomas Wiedmann & Heinz Schandl & Daniel Moran, 2015. "The footprint of using metals: new metrics of consumption and productivity," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 17(3), pages 369-388, July.
    8. Jose-Luis Palacios & Guiomar Calvo & Alicia Valero & Antonio Valero, 2018. "Exergoecology Assessment of Mineral Exports from Latin America: Beyond a Tonnage Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-18, March.
    9. West, James & Schandl, Heinz & Krausmann, Fridolin & Kovanda, Jan & Hak, Tomas, 2014. "Patterns of change in material use and material efficiency in the successor states of the former Soviet Union," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 211-219.
    10. Wang, Zhiping & Feng, Chao & Chen, Jinyu & Huang, Jianbai, 2017. "The driving forces of material use in China: An index decomposition analysis," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 336-348.
    11. Kyaw Maung & Marianne Martinico-Perez & Takahiro Komatsu & Sujauddin Mohammad & Shinsuke Murakami & Hiroki Tanikawa, 2015. "Comparative studies on the driving factors of resource flows in Myanmar, the Philippines, and Bangladesh," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 17(3), pages 407-429, July.
    12. Stefan Giljum & Monika Dittrich & Mirko Lieber & Stephan Lutter, 2014. "Global Patterns of Material Flows and their Socio-Economic and Environmental Implications: A MFA Study on All Countries World-Wide from 1980 to 2009," Resources, MDPI, vol. 3(1), pages 1-21, March.
    13. Baka, Jennifer & Bailis, Robert, 2014. "Wasteland energy-scapes: A comparative energy flow analysis of India's biofuel and biomass economies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 8-17.
    14. Garmendia, Eneko & Urkidi, Leire & Arto, Iñaki & Barcena, Iñaki & Bermejo, Roberto & Hoyos, David & Lago, Rosa, 2016. "Tracing the impacts of a northern open economy on the global environment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 169-181.
    15. Rob Symmes & Tomer Fishman & John N. Telesford & Simron J. Singh & Su‐Yin Tan & Kristen De Kroon, 2020. "The weight of islands: Leveraging Grenada's material stocks to adapt to climate change," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 24(2), pages 369-382, April.
    16. Juan Pablo Ríos Ocampo & Yris Olaya Morales, 2017. "Sustainability of the domestic consumption of construction materials in Colombia, 1990-2013," Lecturas de Economía, Universidad de Antioquia, Departamento de Economía, issue 86, pages 127-151, Enero - J.
    17. Hurmekoski, Elias & Hetemäki, Lauri & Linden, Mika, 2015. "Factors affecting sawnwood consumption in Europe," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 236-248.
    18. Latorre, Sara & Farrell, Katharine N. & Martínez-Alier, Joan, 2015. "The commodification of nature and socio-environmental resistance in Ecuador: An inventory of accumulation by dispossession cases, 1980–2013," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 58-69.
    19. Lutter, Stephan & Giljum, Stefan & Bruckner, Martin, 2016. "A review and comparative assessment of existing approaches to calculate material footprints," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 1-10.
    20. Fishman, Tomer & Schandl, Heinz & Tanikawa, Hiroki, 2015. "The socio-economic drivers of material stock accumulation in Japan's prefectures," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 76-84.
    21. Shupa Rahman & Simron Singh & Cameron McCordic, 2022. "Can the Caribbean localize its food system?: Evidence from biomass flow accounting," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 26(3), pages 1025-1039, June.
    22. Samaniego, Pablo & Vallejo, María Cristina & Martínez-Alier, Joan, 2017. "Commercial and biophysical deficits in South America, 1990–2013," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 62-73.
    23. Shogo Eguchi, 2017. "Understanding productivity declines of resource accumulation in the prefectures of Japan," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 19(2), pages 337-357, April.
    24. Baka, Jennifer & Bailis, Robert, 2014. "Wasteland energy-scapes: a comparative energy flow analysis of India's biofuel and biomass economies," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 59896, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. West, James & Schandl, Heinz & Krausmann, Fridolin & Kovanda, Jan & Hak, Tomas, 2014. "Patterns of change in material use and material efficiency in the successor states of the former Soviet Union," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 211-219.
    2. Vallejo, Maria Cristina, 2010. "Biophysical structure of the Ecuadorian economy, foreign trade, and policy implications," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 159-169, December.
    3. Muñoz, Pablo & Strohmaier, Rita & Roca, Jordi, 2011. "On the North-South trade in the Americas and its ecological asymmetries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(11), pages 1981-1990, September.
    4. LaRota-Aguilera, María José & Delgadillo-Vargas, Olga Lucía & Tello, Enric, 2022. "Sociometabolic research in Latin America: A review on advances and knowledge gaps in agroecological trends and rural perspectives," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    5. Steinberger, Julia K. & Krausmann, Fridolin & Eisenmenger, Nina, 2010. "Global patterns of materials use: A socioeconomic and geophysical analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(5), pages 1148-1158, March.
    6. Piñero, Pablo & Pérez-Neira, David & Infante-Amate, Juan & Chas-Amil, María L. & Doldán-García, Xoán R., 2020. "Unequal raw material exchange between and within countries: Galicia (NW Spain) as a core-periphery economy," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    7. James West & Heinz Schandl, 2018. "Explanatory Variables for National Socio‐Metabolic Profiles and the Question of Forecasting National Material Flows in a Globalized Economy," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 22(6), pages 1451-1464, December.
    8. Gonzalez-Martinez, Ana Citlalic & Schandl, Heinz, 2008. "The biophysical perspective of a middle income economy: Material flows in Mexico," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1-2), pages 317-327, December.
    9. Fishman, Tomer & Schandl, Heinz & Tanikawa, Hiroki, 2015. "The socio-economic drivers of material stock accumulation in Japan's prefectures," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 76-84.
    10. Kostas Bithas & Panos Kalimeris, 2017. "The Material Intensity of Growth: Implications from the Human Scale of Production," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 133(3), pages 1011-1029, September.
    11. Krausmann, Fridolin & Langthaler, Ernst, 2019. "Food regimes and their trade links: A socio-ecological perspective," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 87-95.
    12. Krausmann, Fridolin & Gaugl, Birgit & West, James & Schandl, Heinz, 2016. "The metabolic transition of a planned economy: Material flows in the USSR and the Russian Federation 1900 to 2010," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 76-85.
    13. Henckens, M.L.C.M. & van Ierland, E.C. & Driessen, P.P.J. & Worrell, E., 2016. "Mineral resources: Geological scarcity, market price trends, and future generations," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 102-111.
    14. Anke Schaffartzik & Melanie Pichler, 2017. "Extractive Economies in Material and Political Terms: Broadening the Analytical Scope," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(7), pages 1-17, June.
    15. Venkatachalam ANBUMOZHI & Ponciano S. INTAL, Jr., 2015. "Can Thinking Green and Sustainability Be an Economic Opportunity for ASEAN?," Working Papers DP-2015-66, Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA).
    16. Marco Bianchi & Carlos Tapia & Ikerne del Valle, 2020. "Monitoring domestic material consumption at lower territorial levels: A novel data downscaling method," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 24(5), pages 1074-1087, October.
    17. Krausmann, Fridolin & Gingrich, Simone & Eisenmenger, Nina & Erb, Karl-Heinz & Haberl, Helmut & Fischer-Kowalski, Marina, 2009. "Growth in global materials use, GDP and population during the 20th century," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(10), pages 2696-2705, August.
    18. Julia K Steinberger & Fridolin Krausmann & Michael Getzner & Heinz Schandl & Jim West, 2013. "Development and Dematerialization: An International Study," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(10), pages 1-11, October.
    19. Yoshida, Keisuke & Fishman, Tomer & Okuoka, Keijiro & Tanikawa, Hiroki, 2017. "Material stock's overburden: Automatic spatial detection and estimation of domestic extraction and hidden material flows," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 165-175.
    20. Jose-Luis Palacios & Guiomar Calvo & Alicia Valero & Antonio Valero, 2018. "Exergoecology Assessment of Mineral Exports from Latin America: Beyond a Tonnage Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-18, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:94:y:2013:i:c:p:19-27. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.