Measuring and Comparing the Ecological Footprint and Biological Capacity of Mazandaran Province Townships.

Environmental problems caused by human activities have been raised as a serious challenge for global sustainable development in recent decades. One of the key concepts in this field is the ecological footprint, which refers to the consumption of natural resources by human society and compared to the concept of biological capacity, which indicates the ability of the earth to meet human needs and absorb waste; it evaluates the ecological deficiency of the region. The present study analyzed the biological products in order to calculate the load and pressure on nature as a result of human exploitation and the capacity of the biosphere to provide the land needed for carbon absorption, energy consumption, transportation and etc. In this research, the ecological footprint method with the global hectare (gha) measurement unit has been used to analyze the data, and the ecological deficit has been estimated for the townships Mazandaran province. The results showed that the per capita ecological deficit of the entire province in year of 2021 was - 0.49 global hectares for each person, which indicated the imbalance between economic activities and environmental protection, as well as excessive consumption of natural resources. Ramsar was the most unsustainable township with the highest per capita ecological deficit (1.03 hectares), and Golugah was the most sustainable region in the province with the highest per capita ecological reserve (2.5 global hectares). The research can create a platform for decision makers and officials to take appropriate measures and make informed decisions to preserve the environment and sustainable development of the province. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]