Material Footprint

For a more complete evaluation of the material flows connected to the functioning of an economy, it is appropriate to consider, in addition to domestic material consumption and resource productivity, also those flows necessary to produce imported and exported goods and services. These are the indirect flows, i.e., the part of the so-called ecological rucksack that is transformed into waste or emissions.
A more comprehensive picture can be provided by expressing imports and exports in “material (natural) resources (used) equivalents”, known in the international literature as “raw materials equivalents” (RME). For example, the RME of a given quantity of cereals traded abroad consists, in addition to the cereals themselves, also of what was necessary to extract to produce all the products (goods and services) used as inputs (intermediate consumption) in cultivation activities, such as the oil used to produce fuels for agricultural machinery and the raw materials from which fertilizers spread on the soil are derived.
It is important to note that the part of RME that is not physically contained in the imported goods and services has become, abroad, residual returned to the natural environment or waste accumulated in landfills. This part constitutes the indirect flow of imports. The same applies to exports.
If, in addition to the direct flows with abroad, the indirect flows are also considered, i.e., the resources extracted and used for the production of goods and services traded abroad, the imports and exports in RME are obtained.
The indicator measures the total amount of raw materials extracted to meet the domestic demand of the economic system, i.e., it quantifies the extraction of natural resources — biomass, metal ores, non-metallic minerals, and fossil fuels — globally due to the final consumption and investments of households, companies, and public administration in Italy.