Assessment of the Sustainability Situation in Ahvaz Metropolis City using the Ecological Footprint Method

One of the most important conditions for improvement of the quality of life in present and future is attainment of a sustainable development in society. Sustainable development is a complicated and nebulous concept, which has been assessed through many different methods. Today, the best method for determining the level of the sustainability of societies consists in analyzing the effects of human activities on nature. Accordingly, in this study the situation of sustainability in Ahvaz city is assessed through analysis of the situation of ecologic footprint as well as the biological capacity of Ahvaz City.

The present research enjoys an applied objective and it is done in a descriptive-analytic manner. In this research, the ecologic footprint and the biological capacity of Ahvaz city were determined in the first place and in the second place, the situation of this mega city was compared to the circumstances of the world, Asia and Iran.

The results of the study display that the footprint share of consumption in Ahvaz city is equal to 1.4 hectare and for the whole city it is 1542298.356 hectares and the share of biological capacity in the city is equal to 0.406 hectare and for the whole city it is 444751.1 hectare. The share of transportation footprint and the share of water footprint are the most and the least shares, respectively, in Ahvaz City.

The results show that the ecological footprint of Ahvaz City in comparison to the world level, Asia, and the country is less by 47.85, 20.9 and 47.46 percents, respectively. In addition, the biological capacity of the city is less in comparison to the world, Asia and Iran by 77.18, 50.48 and 49.87 percents, respectively.