GDP, domestic material consumption, and resource productivity in Greece 2000-2022

The realtionship between domestic material consumption (DMC) -  the total amount of material which is directly used in an economy in a given year - and gross domestic product (GDP) - the total amount of goods and services produced in an economy in a given year, measured in monetary values - is one of the key indicators for the ecological sustainability of an economy. Resource productivity is then measured by dividing the total output of an economy by its material consumption in a year.

For Greece, resource productivity declined sharply in the direct run-up to the Eurozone crisis, as material consumption in the Greek economy far out-ran the growth in production, as measured by GDP. Since 2012, however, resouce productivity in the southern European country has been on a consistent upward trend, as while the Greek economy has stabilized following the Eurozone crisis and its serious issues with debt sustainability, domestic material consumption has continued to decline. This 'decoupling' of economic growth from resource consumption is a key target of policymakers, as they seek to grow the economy, whilst also reducing material throughput in order to meet climate and environmental targets.