Direct material input, abbreviated as DMI, is an indicator derived from economy-wide material flow accounts (EW-MFA).
DMI measures the direct and actual input of materials into a given national economy originating from the natural environment or from the rest of the world. It includes the total amount of materials (excluding bulk material flows such as water and air) which are of economic value and are available for the national economy's production system. DMI represents the total material throughput or material scale of an economy.
DMI of a given national economy is calculated as the sum of Domestic extraction (DE) plus physical imports. For individual countries, all imports are considered for the calculation of DMI; whereas for the DMI calculation of the aggregated EU all intra-EU-trade flows are excluded.
The relation of domestic material consumption (DMC) to DMI indicates to what extent inputs of material resources are used for own domestic consumption or are exported to be consumed in other economies.
Related concepts
- Economy-wide material flow accounts (EW-MFA)
- Domestic extraction (DE)
- Domestic material consumption (DMC)