John E. Keith

The benefits and costs of riparian analysis habitat preservation: a willingness to accept/willingness to pay contingent valuation approach

Abstract The Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) was used to obtain the willingness to pay (WTP) of households in the contiguous area of the Garonne River near Toulouse, France, and the willingness to accept (WTA) of households that currently own land on the banks of the river to provide a strip of riparian land for habitat preservation. Results for the WTP study indicated a relatively large difference in WTP between open and closed ended responses. When corrected for the substantial number of 0 observations, the WTP was reduced by about half. The WTA results were constrained by relatively few positive responses. However, the value given by farmers who indicated a positive WTA appears consistent with revenues generated from crops. Moreover, many farmers who were already providing habitat preservation indicated a zero minimum WTA. Although the small number of WTA responses severely limits the ability to draw definitive conclusions, a comparison of the derived benefits (WTP) and costs (WTA) was made, which appeared to suggest the possibility of a favorable a benefit/cost ratio.

Estimating the Recreation Demand and Economic Value of Mountain Biking in Moab, Utah: An Application of Count Data Models

This paper reports the results of both standard and truncated count data travel cost demand models for estimating demand for and the economic value to participants in mountain biking in the Moab, Utah, area. The empirical estimates for average trip demand per person per season were 2.25 and 2.53 trips under truncated Poisson and truncated negative binomial models, respectively. Consumer surplus per person per trip for both models was approximately US

Recreation as an economic development strategy: some evidence from Utah.

585. The total annual use value for mountain biking in the Moab area was US

Economic development in rural Utah: is wilderness recreation the answer?

1.33 million. This value suggests that this recreation has a higher value than most other activities in the area and that public land managers should be aware of the relative value of mountain biking as they make allocation decisions.

Preservation or use A contingent valuation study of wilderness designation in Utah

An examination of employment patterns in rural Utah counties suggests that those counties which primarily rely on tourism and recreation to maintain economic viability exhibit annual employment var...

Employment Stability and the Role of Sectoral Dominance in Rural Economies

Surveys of wilderness users in four selected wilderness areas and proposed wilderness areas in Utah indicated that expenditures by these visitors, while similar to other outdoor recreation participants, are not sufficiently large to significantly influence the local county economies. The application of input-output multipliers to these expenditures suggests that wilderness users contribute significantly less than 1% of total sales to most of these counties, and not more than 2.5% in any county studied.

The Welfare Effects of Restricting Off-Highway Vehicle Access to Public Lands

Evidence of strong opposition to wilderness proposals in Utah suggested that the non-market value of retaining those areas in multiple use management might be significant. A contingent value analysis of both supporters and opponents of the two major proposals for wilderness designation in Utah indicated that there existed significant non-market willingness to pay on the part of opponents, and that standard contingent valuation practice which does not explicitly consider these values could lead to a mis-estimation of aggregate willingness to pay.

A Contingent Valuation Approach to Measuring the Benefits of Preschool Education

Rural development has received renewed attention, particularly in the West, where there are opportunities for enhancing tourism in communities once reliant on extractive resources. The historical focus of rural development has been on economic growth, with little concern about the sustainability or socioeconomic impacts of such growth. This study analyzes and discusses the employment dynamics of rural economies with varying employment bases to illustrate some possible impacts of targeting specific employment sectors as part of a rural economic development strategy. The empirical research focuses on the rural counties of Utah, where the trade and service sectors associated with increased tourism and retirement communities have been rapidly expanding throughout the past two decades. Copyright 1998, Oxford University Press.

Modeling water demand when households have multiple sources of water

Off-highway vehicle (OHV) use is a rapidly growing outdoor activity that results in a host of environmental and management problems. Federal agencies have been directed to develop travel management plans to improve recreation experiences, reduce social conflicts, and diminish environmental impacts of OHVs. We examine the effect of land access restrictions on the welfare of OHV enthusiasts in Utah using Murdocks unobserved heterogeneity random utility model (Murdock 2006). Our models indicate that changing access to public lands from fully “open” to “limited” results in relatively small welfare losses, but that prohibiting access results in much larger welfare losses.

Water Quality Management and Irrigated Agriculture: Potential Conflicts in the Colorado River Basin

It is difficult to quantify and value many of the benefits of education. This paper illustrates the use of contingent valuation to obtain more complete estimates of the economic value of difficult-to-measure benefits of preschool education for handicapped children and presents a general approach for the use of contingent valuation in cost-benefit analysis of educational programs. Data for the illustration were obtained by surveying parents of children with handicapping conditions enrolled in preschool special education programs in Iowa. The survey was conducted jointly by the Department of Economics and the Early Intervention Research Institute at Utah State University. Results indicated that the contingent valuation method produces plausible results which are consistent with basic predictions of economic theory. Implications for policymaking and directions for further research are discussed.