Building global capacity for material flows accounting

We are developing systems for countries to produce and report on their production, trade, and consumption of natural resources, using standardised Material Flows Accounting (MFA).

The challenge

The exchange of materials between the environment and the economy, along with the efficiency with which these materials are used, form the foundation of the most important sustainability challenges facing humanity.

High-quality, national-level accounts on material flows are crucial to understanding how the economy is performing in this sphere. Until recently, there has been no standardised infrastructure for countries to create and report on their national material flows. Training provided in-country has shown limited results.

Our response

Working with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and international collaborators, we are establishing a set of tools and educational materials to support an extensive, global reporting program.

Our leading role in creating and maintaining the Global Material Flows Database will redesign processes for assembling the MFA accounts. This will make them more accurate, more practical, and ultimately more sustainable over the long term than the current centralised model based on various, often proprietary, international databases.

The Global Material Flow Analysis Manual and associated questionnaire with comprehensive compilation tools will equip National Statistical Offices (NSO) with the capability to prepare national material flow accounts.

To ensure the long-term adoption of this system, a universally accessible set of tutorial resources, including videos and text tutorial materials, are available. These resources provide NSOs with the essential guidance needed to effectively utilise the reporting tools in a consistently accessible manner. The complete set, including the manual, compiler, and tutorial materials, is regularly updated and expanded.

All these resources can be accessed through the Economy Wide Material Flow Accounting module on UNEP’s eLearning portal.

Impact

UNEP has received self-reported MFA accounts from over 20 individual countries so far, with the tutorial materials being used both autonomously by NSOs, and by UNEP trainers, to guide the preparation of these accounts.

The 2025 update of the Global Material Flows Database will be the first which integrates MFA accounts prepared autonomously by individual countries, taught, and collated using the free online instructional material and tools, accessible remotely and whenever it suits the individual NSO.

The ambition is that 50 per cent of countries report material flows by 2030.