IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/forpol/v41y2014icp60-67.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diversifying finance mechanisms for protected areas capitalizing on untapped revenues

Author

Listed:
  • Baral, Nabin
  • Dhungana, Anal

Abstract

Protected areas' financial sustainability is critical for improving their effectiveness in conserving biodiversity. This paper aims to estimate visitors' willingness to pay (WTP) higher entry fees to access the Annapurna Conservation Area (ACA) in Nepal, determine variables influencing their WTP decisions, and explore strategies for diversifying ACA's finance mechanisms. Contingent valuation surveys were administered to a random sample of 401 visitors in 2012. About 62% of the visitors were willing to pay higher entry fees than the current US $25 fee. The logit regression results showed that the bid amount, educational attainment and use of a guide were statistically significant predictors of WTP decisions. The mean and median WTP amounts were US $116.7 and US $122, respectively. Ceteris paribus, increasing the entry fee to US $122 would yield about 20million US dollars in surplus revenues in the next 5years, which can be earmarked for establishing a conservation trust fund to diversify ACA's finance mechanisms.

Suggested Citation

  • Baral, Nabin & Dhungana, Anal, 2014. "Diversifying finance mechanisms for protected areas capitalizing on untapped revenues," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 60-67.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:forpol:v:41:y:2014:i:c:p:60-67
    DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2014.01.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1389934114000045
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.forpol.2014.01.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Loomis, John B. & Gonzalez-Caban, Armando, 1998. "A willingness-to-pay function for protecting acres of spotted owl habitat from fire," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 315-322, June.
    2. P. Wilner Jeanty, 2007. "Constructing Krinsky and Robb Confidence Interval for Mean and Median WTP Using Stata," North American Stata Users' Group Meetings 2007 8, Stata Users Group, revised 30 Aug 2007.
    3. Hoehn, John P. & Randall, Alan, 1987. "A satisfactory benefit cost indicator from contingent valuation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 226-247, September.
    4. V. Santhakumar, 2009. "Entry Fees as an Instrument for Environmental Management: Study of a Wildlife Park in Kerala, India," Tourism Economics, , vol. 15(2), pages 453-466, June.
    5. W. Michael Hanemann, 1984. "Welfare Evaluations in Contingent Valuation Experiments with Discrete Responses," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 66(3), pages 332-341.
    6. Baral, Nabin & Stern, Marc J. & Bhattarai, Ranju, 2008. "Contingent valuation of ecotourism in Annapurna conservation area, Nepal: Implications for sustainable park finance and local development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 218-227, June.
    7. Krinsky, Itzhak & Robb, A Leslie, 1986. "On Approximating the Statistical Properties of Elasticities," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 68(4), pages 715-719, November.
    8. Shultz, Steven & Pinazzo, Jorge & Cifuentes, Miguel, 1998. "Opportunities and limitations of contingent valuation surveys to determine national park entrance fees: evidence from Costa Rica," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 3(1), pages 131-149, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Baral, Nabin & Rabotyagov, Sergey, 2017. "How much are wood-based cellulosic biofuels worth in the Pacific Northwest? Ex-ante and ex-post analysis of local people's willingness to pay," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 99-106.
    2. Pramod Lamsal & Kishor Atreya & Krishna Prasad Pant & Lalit Kumar, 2016. "Tourism and wetland conservation: application of travel cost and willingness to pay an entry fee at Ghodaghodi Lake Complex, Nepal," Natural Resources Forum, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(1-2), pages 51-61, February.
    3. Minh-Hoang Nguyen & Thomas E. Jones, 2022. "Building eco-surplus culture among urban residents as a novel strategy to improve finance for conservation in protected areas," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-15, December.
    4. Kaffashi, Sara & Yacob, Mohd Rusli & Clark, Maynard S. & Radam, Alias & Mamat, Mohd Farid, 2015. "Exploring visitors' willingness to pay to generate revenues for managing the National Elephant Conservation Center in Malaysia," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 9-19.
    5. Kubo, Takahiro & Shoji, Yasushi & Tsuge, Takahiro & Kuriyama, Koichi, 2018. "Voluntary Contributions to Hiking Trail Maintenance: Evidence From a Field Experiment in a National Park, Japan," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 124-128.
    6. Nguyen, Minh-Hoang, 2023. "Investigating urban residents' involvement in biodiversity conservation in protected areas: Empirical evidence from Vietnam," Thesis Commons z2hjv, Center for Open Science.
    7. Johane Dikgang & Edwin Muchapondwa, 2017. "The determination of park fees in support of benefit sharing in Southern Africa," Tourism Economics, , vol. 23(6), pages 1165-1183, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kerstin K Zander & Gillian B Ainsworth & Jürgen Meyerhoff & Stephen T Garnett, 2014. "Threatened Bird Valuation in Australia," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(6), pages 1-9, June.
    2. Baral, Nabin & Stern, Marc J. & Bhattarai, Ranju, 2008. "Contingent valuation of ecotourism in Annapurna conservation area, Nepal: Implications for sustainable park finance and local development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 218-227, June.
    3. J. Paul Combs & Rickey C. Kirkpatrick & Jason F. Shogren & Joseph A. Herriges, 1993. "Matching Grants and Public Goods: a Closed-Ended Contingent Valuation Experiment," Public Finance Review, , vol. 21(2), pages 178-195, April.
    4. Catherine M. H. Keske & Adam Mayer, 2014. "Visitor Willingness to Pay U.S. Forest Service Recreation Fees in New West Rural Mountain Economies," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 28(1), pages 87-100, February.
    5. Carmelo Javier León, 1995. "El método dicotómico de valoración contingente: una aplicación a los espacios naturales en Gran Canaria," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 19(1), pages 83-106, January.
    6. Hermann Donfouet & P. Jeanty & P.-A. Mahieu, 2014. "Dealing with internal inconsistency in double-bounded dichotomous choice: an application to community-based health insurance," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 317-328, February.
    7. Vivien Foster & Susana Mourato, 2003. "Elicitation Format and Sensitivity to Scope," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 24(2), pages 141-160, February.
    8. Moore, Rebecca & Bishop, Richard C. & Provencher, Bill & Champ, Patricia A., 2009. "Accounting for Respondent Uncertainty to Improve Willingness-to-Pay Estimates," Staff Papers 92233, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    9. Nikita Lyssenko & Roberto Mart󹑺-Espiñeira, 2012. "Respondent uncertainty in contingent valuation: the case of whale conservation in Newfoundland and Labrador," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(15), pages 1911-1930, May.
    10. Diederich, Johannes & Goeschl, Timo, 2011. "Willingness to Pay for Individual Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reductions: Evidence from a Large Field Experiment," Working Papers 0517, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    11. Bateman, Ian J. & Langford, Ian H. & Jones, Andrew P. & Kerr, Geoffrey N., 2001. "Bound and path effects in double and triple bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 191-213, July.
    12. Brian Witt, 2019. "Tourists’ Willingness to Pay Increased Entrance Fees at Mexican Protected Areas: A Multi-Site Contingent Valuation Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-22, May.
    13. Scarpa, Riccardo & Chilton, Susan M. & Hutchinson, W. George & Buongiorno, Joseph, 2000. "Valuing the recreational benefits from the creation of nature reserves in Irish forests," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 237-250, May.
    14. Rebecca Moore & Richard C. Bishop & Bill Provencher & Patricia A. Champ, 2010. "Accounting for Respondent Uncertainty to Improve Willingness‐to‐Pay Estimates," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 58(3), pages 381-401, September.
    15. Richard Yao & Pamela Kaval, 2008. "Valuing Biodiversity Enhancement in New Zealand," Working Papers in Economics 08/07, University of Waikato.
    16. Roberto Ponce & Felipe Vásquez & Alejandra Stehr & Patrick Debels & Carlos Orihuela, 2011. "Estimating the Economic Value of Landscape Losses Due to Flooding by Hydropower Plants in the Chilean Patagonia," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 25(10), pages 2449-2466, August.
    17. Brey, Raul & Riera, Pere & Mogas, Joan, 2007. "Estimation of forest values using choice modeling: An application to Spanish forests," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 305-312, December.
    18. Poe, Gregory L. & Lossin, Eric K. & Welsh, Michael P., 1992. "A Convolutions Approach to Measuring the Differences in Benefit Estimates from Dichotomous Choice Contingent Valuation Studies," Staff Papers 200545, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics.
    19. Chaikaew, Pasicha & Hodges, Alan W. & Grunwald, Sabine, 2017. "Estimating the value of ecosystem services in a mixed-use watershed: A choice experiment approach," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 228-237.
    20. Tuan, Tran Huu & Navrud, Stale, 2009. "Applying the dissonance-minimising format to value cultural heritage in developing countries," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 53(3), pages 1-17.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:forpol:v:41:y:2014:i:c:p:60-67. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/forpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.