The last few years has seen considerable growth in methods by which we can gain a better understanding as to the providence of what we buy.  Consumers are increasingly able to detect whether products were ethically sourced, manufactured by child labor or produced using poor farming practices.

Such things have helped raise awareness among consumers of the costs of a product beyond that of the purchase price.  Despite the progress that has been made, it can still be difficult to be sure that the things you buy were made using approaches that sit well with your personal values.

Researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology have set out to fix that by developing a system that identifies the threats to wildlife caused by the global supply chains we have come to depend on.

Ethical consumption

The researchers examined 6,803 vulnerable marine and terrestrial animals (as classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature) to calculate the percentage threat to the species by consumption of goods.

For instance, the data revealed that consumption patterns in the United States had a particularly strong impact on species in Southeast Asia and Madagascar, whilst also impacting southern Europe, southern Mexico, Central Asia and even southern Canada.

The team hope that their work will shed light on the connection between consumption and environmental impact, with that insight then feeding into policy efforts to mitigate the impacts.

“Connecting observations of environmental problems to economic activity, that is the innovation here,” they say. “Once you connect the environmental impact to a supply chain, then many people along the supply chain, not only producers, can participate in cleaning up that supply chain.”

For instance, such insights might allow regulators to target only those producers who do significant damage to biodiversity or deforestation in a particular region.

“If the EU wanted to look at its role in causing those problems in Indonesia, they could look at the maps produced by the researchers and see what kind of impacts EU consumers are having on that country, and where those impacts are located—the hotspots,” the researchers say.

“They could decide to adjust their research programmes or environmental priorities to focus on certain hotspots in Southeast Asia,” they continue. “Companies could also use these maps to find out where their environmental impact hotspots are, and make changes.”