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Approaches to Define Environmental Debt in the Framework of Sustainable Development

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Responsible Consumption and Production

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals ((ENUNSDG))

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Synonyms

Ecological debt; Green debt

Definition

Environmental debt refers to the accumulation of past environmental impacts of natural resource depletion and environmental degradation, owed to future generations (OECD 2018). The environmental cost accumulation represents an environmental debt. Environmental debt incurred by past generation indicates the responsibility of the current generations for environmental effects that would have to be borne by future generations (Ljungman 1998).

Introduction

Firstly, the term “ecological debt” was defined in the paper in 1985, in a yellow booklet with the title “Women in movement” made by the German ecofeminist. Then, the first papers in which scientists paid attention to the problem of meaning and accounting the environmental debt were “Miljoskulden” (Jernelöv 1993) and “Deuda ecologica” (Robleto and Marcelo 1992). Noticed that these two papers described two different point of views on environmental debts. Robleto and Marcelo’s report...

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Correspondence to Tetyana Pimonenko .

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Pimonenko, T., Chygryn, O. (2019). Approaches to Define Environmental Debt in the Framework of Sustainable Development. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A., Brandli, L., Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Responsible Consumption and Production. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_64-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_64-1

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  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

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