Abstract

ZUBERMAN, Federico. Virtual soil and ecological debt: A calculation for the soybean expansion in Argentina. SaberEs [online]. 2019, vol.11, n.1, pp.81-95. ISSN 1852-4418.

Ecological Economics is characterized, among other things, by developing indicators of social metabolism that allow accounting the level of appropriation of the natural resources by societies. In recent years, indicators as Virtual Soil and Nutrient Footprint have been developed with the aim of reflecting the pressure that societies makes on the soils as a basic resource for agricultural production. This paper tries to make a contribution in relation to calculate the export of virtual soil for the cultivation of soybean in Argentina since its first expansion as an export crop 1970 to 2015. Additionally, without performing a typical calculation of the Environmental Economics, it tries to make a monetary estimation of how much those nutrients exported represents in chemical fertilizer equivalents. In this way, as a general conclusion, we propose that virtual soil and nutrient footprint could be considered as a part of the ecological debt and environmental liability of our country

Keywords : Social metabolism; Nutrient footprin; Nutrient exportation.

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