scholarly journals Benefit-Cost Analysis with Local Residents’ Stated Preference Information: A Study of Non-Motorized Transport Investments in Pune, India

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hua Wang ◽  
Ke Fang ◽  
Yuyan Shi

One of the major difficulties in doing benefit-cost analyses of a development project is to estimate a total economic value of the project benefits, which are usually multi-dimensional and include goods and services that are not traded in the market, and challenges also arise in aggregating the values of different benefits, which may not be mutually exclusive. This paper presents an analysis of a non-motorized transport project in Pune, India, which uses the contingent valuation method to estimate the total value of the project benefits across beneficiaries. A sample of the project beneficiaries are presented with a detailed description of the project and then are asked to vote on whether such a project should be undertaken given different specifications of costs to their households. A function of willingness-to-pay for the project is then derived from the survey answers and the key determinants are found to include household income, distance to the project streets, current use of the transportation modes, future use of the project streets, predicted impacts of the project, and level of trust in the government. The total willingness-to-pay of the local residents is found to be smaller than the total cost of an initial design of the project. Heteroskedasticity is also found to present in the willingness-to-pay models.

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leidy Y. García ◽  
Arcadio A. Cerda ◽  
Rocio del P. Lagos ◽  
Patricio I. Muñoz ◽  
Monserrat Muñoz

Introduction: Air pollution is present in most cities in Chile due to smoke produced from firewood, as happened in many developing countries, generating various health problems among the population. This situation is especially prevalent in all cities in central and southern Chile. To mitigate it, the government implemented several measures, among which are the promotion of the use of certified dry firewood and hourly restrictions on the use of wood-burning stoves for heating according to the peak emissions of particulate matter.Objective: The objective of this study was to determine the willingness to pay for certified dry firewood as a means of reducing environmental restrictions on the use of wood-burning stoves to heat households.Materials and methods: The study used a non-market valuation, specifically contingent valuation, method using a double-bounded dichotomous choice format with the estimation of biprobit econometric models.Results: The results showed that the average individual was willing to pay 12 USD, and extrapolating that to the local population’s willingness to pay yielded an economic value of 3,415,140 USD, which to a certain extent represents the valuation of air pollution damage.Conclusion: Our results showed that people positively valued the use of dry firewood as a payment vehicle to improve air quality and thereby reduce restrictions on the use of certified dry firewood for heating. Therefore, complementary environmental policy measures should be continued to address the problem of air pollution in both the short and long term.


1967 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 416-420
Author(s):  
Arthur MacEwan

These books are numbers 4 and 5, respectively, in the series "Studies in the Economic Development of India". The two books are interesting complements to one another, both being concerned with the analysis of projects within national plan formulation. However, they treat different sorts of problems and do so on very different levels. Marglin's Public Investment Criteria is a short treatise on the problems of cost-benefit analysis in an Indian type economy, i.e., a mixed economy in which the government accepts a large planning responsibility. The book, which is wholely theoretical, explains the many criteria needed for evaluation of projects. The work is aimed at beginning students and government officials with some training in economics. It is a clear and interesting "introduction to the special branch of economics that concerns itself with systematic analysis of investment alternatives from the point of view of a government".


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Daniel Acland

Abstract Benefit-cost analysis (BCA) is typically defined as an implementation of the potential Pareto criterion, which requires inclusion of any impact for which individuals have willingness to pay (WTP). This definition is incompatible with the exclusion of impacts such as rights and distributional concerns, for which individuals do have WTP. I propose a new definition: BCA should include only impacts for which consumer sovereignty should govern. This is because WTP implicitly preserves consumer sovereignty, and is thus only appropriate for ‘sovereignty-warranting’ impacts. I compare the high cost of including non-sovereignty-warranting impacts to the relatively low cost of excluding sovereignty-warranting impacts.


Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (19) ◽  
pp. 2649
Author(s):  
Frederick Y. S. Lee ◽  
Anson T. H. Ma ◽  
Lewis T. O. Cheung

River revitalization, also called river restoration, has been implemented globally to restore urban river ecosystems that would benefit both the environment and local residents in various ways. The Hong Kong government has been attempting to revitalize local urban rivers; however, the perception and value of river restoration have not been assessed. With the application of a contingent valuation method, a questionnaire survey was designed to capture the attitude, place attachment, and willingness to pay (WTP) of Hong Kong residents in the context of urban rivers and river revitalization, and a proposed scenario for revitalization is given. The relationships among WTP, attitude and place attachment were explored through regression analysis. A total of 400 questionnaire samples were collected from Hong Kong residents, and over 75% of respondents were willing to pay for the proposed scenario. The results from regression analysis indicated that attitude, place dependence, place identity, and place social bonding positively influenced WTP and WTP bid amounts. In contrast, the place effect was unexpectedly found to be negatively correlated with WTP. Implications were drawn from these results, and recommendations were made concerning the features to be restored and conserved in future river revitalization work and the need to provide quality urban nature-based spaces for citizens.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-88
Author(s):  
Christina Utami ◽  
Metta Padmalia

The purpose of this study is to estimate and analyze the willingness to pay  and fax tor the factors that affect the willingness to pay at High School in the of Semarang. The method used is Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) and multiple linear regression analysis. The number of samples in this study were 238 respondents, the sampling technique was done by snowball sampling. The results of this study indicate that the average willingness to pay (WTP) of households in High Schools in Semarang is Rp.559.034,00. Factors that have a significant influence on WTP values are income variables, number of household dependents, age and length of access. Whereas the factors that have no effect on willingness to pay (WTP) are parents' education variables. Based on the results of the study, the suggestions that can be put forward are the management or the government to improve the quality of the Vocational School as well as the development of a transparency policy on the collection and allocation of user fees and other resources.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 47
Author(s):  
Muhammad-Jawad Iqbal ◽  
Abdul-Rahim Samad Abdul

Green electricity, which comes from renewable sources such as wind, hydro and solar, are well appreciated for their being environment friendly. The advantage of these sources are apparent in part of already natural environment. Moreover, this modern form of electricity also contributes in the poverty alleviation in developing countries, which is one of the sustainable development goals (SDG). The objective of this study is to explore electricity consumers’ willingness to pay for the sustainable energy by employing the contingent valuation method (CVM). The respondents were divided into two broad categories of urban and rural consumers. A total of 400 respondents from urban and 405 respondents from rural areas were selected for this study. The CVM calculated the overall price of green electricity for the improvement of environment through increasing the share of electricity from renewable energy sources. The widely used WTP measure double-bounded dichotomous was utilised to elicit the appropriate value of green electricity from the bid price. The results from the logit regressions showed that the respondents with high income and a higher level of education are willing to pay more for green electricity in both urban and rural models. However, results also revealed that the willingness to pay for green electricity is high in younger people than older people. The mean willingness to pay has found 0.33 cents per kWh in the urban model, while is 0.24 in the rural model. The results provided a guideline to the government to charge an appropriate surcharge from the consumers in order to enhance the share of green electricity in energy mix.


Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 1411 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathaniel Maynard ◽  
Pierre-Alexandre Château ◽  
Lauriane Ribas-Deulofeu ◽  
Je-Liang Liou

Without appropriate conservation action, coral reefs globally continue to degrade, causing declines in economic value. Therefore, their local conservation and quantifying its benefits become increasingly important. However, accurately measuring these values remains expensive or complicated. Leveraging digital survey tools, an interdisciplinary on-line survey was created to estimate willingness to pay (WTP) for coral reef conservation using pictures and ecological data. Using the contingent valuation method we estimate current values as well as changes in value due to restoration or degradation for coral ecosystems in the Kenting National Park (KNP) in Taiwan. Results suggest that conserving degraded coral reef ecosystems leads to larger gains in value than healthier ones. Average WTP estimates a non-market economic value of 680 million US$ per year for the whole KNP marine area. Despite potential self-reporting bias and limits on sample size, these values appear consistent with similar studies and suggest future economic sampling strategies for KNP.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 462-495 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Getzner ◽  
Denise Schulz-Zak

The European Union’s regulation for chemical safety (REACH) addresses the registration, evaluation, assessment, and consequent authorization (or restriction) of chemicals which are potentially harmful for both public health and the environment. The current study aims at ascertaining the costs and benefits of the REACH framework for the Austrian economy under major uncertainties, and draws on a wide range of databases on public and workplace health, chemical accidents in households, and the potential environmental impacts of harmful chemicals.The uncertainties in the REACH system assessments of the effects of chemicals on health lie not only in the insufficiency of scientific evidence but also in the economic evaluation of effects on health, especially in regard to the value of statistical life (VSL), and the economic value of diseases attributed to chemicals.This benefit-cost analysis (BCA) of the REACH system in Austria therefore takes into account these manifold uncertainties by designing a conservative baseline scenario and by varying all determinants in comprehensive sensitivity analyses. Projected over a period of about 30 years, this paper provides evidence that the REACH system most probably leads to net benefits for the Austrian economy (benefit-cost ratio of about 10.6) even though many benefits are still highly uncertain or unknown.


2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 441-456
Author(s):  
Seth Binder

AbstractSince its introduction to the field of environmental and natural resource economics in the late 1960s, existence value has faced several critiques from economists, psychologists, and philosophers. Critics have taken aim at the notion’s conceptual ambiguity and lack of connection to observable behavior, its incompatibility with cognitive processes and its sensitivity to cognitive biases, and ethical shortcomings in applying existence values to environmental decisionmaking. Unlike some critiques of existence value that draw on cognitive and ethical frameworks for decisionmaking fundamentally at odds with stated preference methods and benefit–cost analysis (BCA), this paper takes as given the use and adequacy of both. It focuses on challenges to existence value per se, with respect to the ability of existence value estimates to contribute to benefit–cost analyses in a way that is consistent with qualities of BCA that its proponents value: the objectivity, commensurability, and moral salience of the values analyzed. In light of the challenges, inclusion of existence value in benefit–cost analyses is found to inevitably compromise the quality of the BCA with respect to each criterion.


1994 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 45-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter A Diamond ◽  
Jerry A Hausman

Without market outcomes for comparison, internal consistency tests, particularly adding-up tests, are needed for credibility. When tested, contingent valuation has failed. Proponents find surveys tested poorly done. To the authors’ knowledge, no survey has passed these tests. The ‘embedding effect’ is the similarity of willingness-to-pay responses that theory suggests (and sometimes requires) be different. This problem has long been recognized but not solved. The authors conclude that current methods are not suitable for damage assessment or benefit-cost analysis. They believe the problems come from an absence of preferences, not a flaw in survey methodology, making improvement unlikely.


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