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Target 12.2

Resource use

target 12.2

By 2030, achieve the sustainable management and efficient use of natural resources.

Indicator 12.2.1

Material footprint, material footprint per capita, and material footprint per GDP.

Domestic Material Consumption (DMC) and Material Footprint (MF) cover the two aspects of the economy, production and consumption. DMC reports the amount of materials that are directly used within a national economy. These include materials extracted in the country, plus those directly imported through trade of goods and services, minus those directly exported to other countries. MF provides an additional perspective by taking into account materials required across the whole global supply chain to produce a good/service and attributing them to the final demand. A country can, for instance have a very high DMC because it has a large primary production sector for export, while its final demand for materials might be relatively low. Conversely, a country may have a very low DMC because it has outsourced most of the material intensive industrial processes to other countries, while domestic consumers maintain a high level of demand for goods and services. MF corrects for both phenomena and ensures that material flows underpinning a country’s consumption, but that largely take place in other countries’ territories (and cause environmental impacts there), are attributed to the final consumers.

Related SDGs

Global and Regional Progress

Guidance material

Related resources

Indicator 12.2.2

Domestic material consumption, domestic material consumption per capita, and domestic material consumption per GDP.

Domestic Material Consumption (DMC) and Material Footprint (MF) cover the two aspects of the economy, production and consumption. DMC reports the amount of materials that are directly used within a national economy. These include materials extracted in the country, plus those directly imported through trade of goods and services, minus those directly exported to other countries. MF provides an additional perspective by taking into account materials required across the whole global supply chain to produce a good/service and attributing them to the final demand. A country can, for instance have a very high DMC because it has a large primary production sector for export, while its final demand for materials might be relatively low. Conversely, a country may have a very low DMC because it has outsourced most of the material intensive industrial processes to other countries, while domestic consumers maintain a high level of demand for goods and services. MF corrects for both phenomena and ensures that material flows underpinning a country’s consumption, but that largely take place in other countries’ territories (and cause environmental impacts there), are attributed to the final consumers.

Related SDGs

Global and Regional Progress

Guidance material

Related resources