Using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently

Figure 9 shows the proportion of indicator components for which ‘Using resources from nature more sustainably and efficiently’ is the primary goal that have been assigned to each assessment category, with the exact number of indicator components shown as a label on the bars.

Three indicators are classed as ‘not assessed’ in Figure 9 because they are still in development (C11 status of sensitive fish and shellfish stocks, E7 healthy soils and E9 percentage of our seafood coming from healthy ecosystems, produced sustainably).

It is not possible to simply define any change in the 4 agriculture related indicators (E1 to E4) as an ‘improvement’ or ‘deterioration’ as this will depend on whether the specific farming practices driving change are positive for the environment and there will be inherent trade-offs of impact to account for. The assessment results for these indicators are therefore not included in Figure 9. However, it is possible to state the direction of change in Table 10. Both volume of agricultural production and volume of inputs used in agricultural production have increased in the short and medium term.

Of the remaining 8 indicator components, 7 showed an improvement over the medium term and 1 showed little or no change. However, over the short term, 5 indicators moved into a less positive category; E8b Per capita water consumption in England and J2a Raw material consumption moved to deterioration, and E5 Percentage of the annual growth of trees that is harvested, E8a Water leakage and J2b Gross value added per kg of raw material consumption moved to little or no change. The short-term time period covered the most recent 5 years for which an assessment could be made. This varied from 2012 to 2017 to 2016 to 2021, depending on the indicator. E5 and E6 did not have sufficiently long time series available for a long-term assessment, but all others showed an improvement over this period.