ABSTRACT
These three management rules characterise a sustainable use of natural resources. Hence, sustainability indicators should reflect how far the actual use of natural resources is away from this objective. Daly has used the metaphor of ‘plimsoll lines’ to describe this function of scale limits (Daly, 1992). According to Opschoor and Reijnders (1991), main steps in the process of deriving such indicators are: • Identification of main elements of natural capital and their economic functions.• Selection of the most important, endangered elements to be chosen for an indicator set. Although the degree of endangerment is not known exactly in all cases, such a scoping process seems to be reasonable for setting priorities.• Setting of standards being oriented on the rules of sustainable resource use.• Construction of indicators reflecting the actual condition of the environment in relation to the sustainability standards.
