Valuation of non-priced amenities provided by the biological resources within the Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve, Costa Rica

To quantify the economic benefits of the Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve and to test the contingent valuation method in a third world setting, a contingent valuation survey was designed with five experimental treatments. These determined an overall expected value per visitor; determined and compared two ways of eliciting value, single versus annual lump-sum payments; and compared average values of Costa Rican versus non-Costa Rican visitors. Visitors were willing to pay to prevent the Preserve's converssion to agricultural uses. Monteverde's values as a preserve appears much higher than any value it might have in agricultural use. Despite lower incomes, Costa Rican visitors valued the Preserve more highly than not-Costa Rican visitors. Visitors may have differentiated only weakly between greatly differing bid amounts. Expected values derived from econometric analysis of the differing experimental treatments suggest that further methodological adaptation of the contingent valuation method may be required when 1) when it is applied in third world settings, and 2) when precision is critical in estimating WTP's.

Bibliographic Details

Main Authors:	107291 Pérez, A.C., 64426 Echeverría, J., 127718 Vartanián, D., 12822 International Society for Ecological Economics, Washington, DC (EUA), 20110 Universidad Nacional, Heredia (Costa Rica), IICA, San José (Costa Rica) 14, 6056 Consejo de la Tierra, San José (Costa Rica), 3. Biennial Meeting of the International Society for Ecological Economics San José (Costa Rica) 24-28 Oct 1994
Format:	biblioteca
Published:	San José (Costa Rica) 1994
Subjects:	BIODIVERSIDAD, CONSERVACION DE LOS RECURSOS, VALOR ECONOMICO, RESERVAS FORESTALES, BOSQUE NUBOSO, MONTEVERDE, COSTA RICA,
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