Estimates put the amount of raw materials necessary to satisfy the world consumption in a year (material footprint) at 92 billion tonnes, and the actual material use (material consumption) reaches comparable levels. There are visible differences between the volume of domestic material consumption and material footprint across regions. In Europe and Northern America, DMC is lower than material footprint (by over 3 billion tonnes in each of them), which means that the countries of these regions consume not only their own resources, but also the imported ones. In the majority of the remaining regions, domestic material consumption is lower than material footprint (these regions export their natural resources). The most notable difference can be observed in Asia and the Pacific (11 billion tonnes), and a considerably smaller one – in Western Asia and Africa (1 to 2 billion tonnes).

The largest material footprint (47 billion tonnes) and DMC (58 billion tonnes) is reported in the Asia and Pacific region, and the smallest in Oceania, Western Asia and Africa (1 to a few billion tonnes). In most of the world’s regions these two indicators have increased since 2005, although Northern America, for example, recorded a decrease in both material footprint (by 13%) and domestic material consumption (by 22%). Domestic material consumption has also fallen slightly in Europe (by 2%) since 2015.

As the UN indicates, the consumption of raw materials is growing at a faster rate than the world’s population. Both the global material footprint and the domestic material consumption per capita have increased from nearly 10 tonnes in 2005 to 11-12 tonnes. Their growth, most significant in Asia, has been observed in the majority of the world’s regions. Among the exceptions to this trend is Northern America, which has seen a decrease in each of them. This region is nevertheless characterised by the largest consumption of raw materials per person: material footprint per capita in Northern America is 31 tonnes, and domestic material consumption 21 tonnes. The lowest values of material footprint (3 tonnes) and material consumption (5 tonnes) per person, on the contrary, is observed in Africa.

Non-metallic raw materials and non-metallic construction materials are used by the world economy to the largest degree of all materials – the annual world consumption of each of them equals 6 tonnes per person (growth by 2 tonnes compared to 2005 in both cases). Biomass, whose level of consumption has remained stable since 2005 and amounts to 3 tonnes per person annually, ranks third. Northern America, Asia and Oceania are the world’s largest consumers of non-metallic raw materials and non-metallic consumption materials, with their annual consumption per capita amounting to 6-8 tonnes. Oceania, Latin America and the Caribbean are the leaders in biomass consumption (7 tonnes per person a year).

Domestic Material Consumption per capita (tonnes)