title: Long-term trajectories of the human appropriation of net primary production: Lessons from six national case studies.
abstract: The 'human appropriation of net primary production' (HANPP) is an integrated socio-ecological indicator measuring effects of land use on ecological biomass flows. Based on published data for Austria, Hungary, the Philippines, South Africa, Spain and the UK, this paper investigates long-term trends in aboveground HANPP and discusses the relations between population, economic growth, changes in biomass use and land-use intensity and their influences on national HANPP trajectories. During early stages of industrialization, population growth and increasing demand for biomass drive land-cover change, often resulting in deforestation, which raises HANPP. During later stages, industrialization of agriculture boosts agricultural yields often faster than biomass demand grows, resulting in stable or even declining HANPP. Technological change improves agricultural area-efficiency (biomass provision per unit area), thereby decoupling population and economic growth from HANPP. However, these efficiency gains require large inputs of fossil fuels and agrochemicals resulting in pressures on ecosystems and emissions. Our findings corroborate the argument that HANPP alone cannot - as sometimes suggested - be used as a simple measure of carrying capacity. Nevertheless, analyses of long-term HANPP trajectories in combination with accounts of material and energy flows can provide important insights into the sustainability of land use, thereby helping to understand limits to growth.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Social Ecology Vienna (SEC), Alpen-Adria Universitaet, Schottenfeldgasse 29, 1070 Vienna, Austria.
authors.forename: Fridolin
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Krausmann
authors.forename: Simone
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Gingrich
authors.forename: Helmut
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Haberl
authors.forename: Karl-Heinz
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Erb
authors.forename: Annabella
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Musel
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kastner
authors.forename: Norbert
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kohlheb
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Niedertscheider
authors.forename: Elmar
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Schwarzlmüller
keywords: Biomass; Forest transition; Human appropriation of net primary production (HANPP); Land-use intensity; Long-term socio-ecological research (LTSER)
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Jul 31;104(31):12942-7
references.pmid: 17616580
references.citation: Curr Opin Environ Sustain. 2010 Dec;2(5-6):394-403
references.pmid: 24069093
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2003 Jul 8;100(14):8068-73
references.pmid: 12819346
references.citation: Nature. 2004 Jun 24;429(6994):870-3
references.pmid: 15215863
references.citation: Science. 2003 May 2;300(5620):758-62
references.pmid: 12730592
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2010 Dec 7;107(49):20917-22
references.pmid: 21078977
references.citation: Science. 2001 Apr 27;292(5517):641-2
references.pmid: 11330321
references.citation: Science. 2005 Jul 22;309(5734):570-4
references.pmid: 16040698
references.citation: Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2008 Feb 27;363(1492):789-813
references.pmid: 17827109
references.citation: Science. 2010 Feb 12;327(5967):812-8
references.pmid: 20110467
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2006 Nov 14;103(46):17574-9
references.pmid: 17101996