Calculating the Ecological Footprint of a company ought to fulfil certain requirements. It has to take into account the direct Footprint impacts such as direct land appropriation and emissions from vehicles and premises. And it also must take account of indirect impacts that are embodied in all the purchases the company makes. As companies and individual (final) consumers are not at the same place in the life-cycle of production and consumption, different calculations and conversion factors have to be applied, otherwise there would be double-counting and non-comparability of Footprints. This report presents an extended input-output approach to calculate Footprints of companies that are truly comparable and discusses the implications for sustainable chain management and sector sustainability. The results have been published in the Journal of Industrial Ecology .
