Work

Integrating nature-based tourism and forestry in private lands under heterogeneous visitor preferences for forest attributes

Year: 2017

Type: article

Abstract: Developing nature-based tourism in private lands calls for new mechanisms to consolidate the interests of the tourism industry, visitors, and landowners. This choice experiment study elaborates on the heterogeneity of visitors’ preferences and willingness to pay (WTP) for enhanced forest amenities and ecosystem services. The survey, targeting domestic and foreign tourists visiting the Ruka-Kuusamo area in Finland, considered four attributes: landscape quality, outdoor routes, forest biodiversity, and carbon sequestration. For observed heterogeneity, the visitors were grouped by their attitudes towards forest management. Unobserved heterogeneity in visitors’ choice behaviour and WTP was examined with the latent class model. While most visitors had environmentally friendly attitudes and were willing to pay, especially for enhanced landscape quality and biodiversity, considerable heterogeneity was revealed in terms of three segments with distinctive attitudes, choice behaviour and WTP. The variation in WTP has important implications for the design of a scheme of payments for environmental management.

Source: Journal of Environmental Planning and Management

DOI: 10.1080/09640568.2017.1333408

Authors: Erkki Mäntymaa, Ville Ovaskainen, Artti Juutinen, Liisa Tyrväinen

Institutions: Natural Resources Institute Finland, University of Oulu

Language: English

Topic: Economic and Environmental Valuation

Subfield: Economics and Econometrics

Field: Economics, Econometrics and Finance

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Life on land

Open Access status: hybrid

Funders: Horizon 2020 Framework Programme, Seventh Framework Programme