IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/eerhrr/96384.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Assessing national values to protect the health of the Great Barrier Reef

Author

Listed:
  • Rolfe, John
  • Windle, Jill

Abstract

The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) is a vast iconic environmental asset covering an area of approximately 35 million hectares. It is valued by people all over Australia, as well as overseas. Non-market values for the GBR will comprise both use and non-use values. The values of people who live closer to the GBR and who can visit it more frequently are likely to be higher than those who live further away. The aim of this study was to estimate the values to protect the health of the GBR at the national level and to examine the effects of distance decay on valuation estimates. A split-sample choice-modelling experiment was conducted in six locations: a regional town within the GBR catchment area (Townsville); Brisbane, the state capital approximately 450 km from the southern limit of the GBR; and four other capital cities (Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth) ranging from 730 km to over 3600 km from Brisbane. The results indicate that the total national value for a 1 per cent improvement in the health of the GBR ranges from between a low of approximately $433.6 million to a high of $811.3 million, depending on the underlying assumptions made. There was some evidence of distance decay in values. Most decline occurred once outside the home state, and little further decline once away from the east coast. There was no evidence to suggest any difference in patterns of use and non-use values. The values of the potential future users were most influential in determining WTP estimates.

Suggested Citation

  • Rolfe, John & Windle, Jill, 2010. "Assessing national values to protect the health of the Great Barrier Reef," Research Reports 96384, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:eerhrr:96384
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.96384
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/96384/files/EERH_RR72.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.96384?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. van Bueren, Martin & Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2004. "Towards the development of a transferable set of value estimates for environmental attributes," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 48(1), pages 1-32.
    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. Gillespie, Robert & Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2010. "Non Use Economic Values of Marine Protected Areas in the South-West Marine Region," Research Reports 107582, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    2. Farr, Marina & Stoeckl, Natalie & Alam Beg, Rabiul, 2014. "The non-consumptive (tourism) ‘value’ of marine species in the Northern section of the Great Barrier Reef," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 89-103.
    3. Gillespie, Robert & Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2011. "Non Use Economic Values of Marine Protected Areas in the South-West Marine Area," Research Reports 107852, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    4. Robert Gillespie & Jeff Bennett, 2011. "Non Use Economic Values of Marine Protected Areas in the South-West Marine Area," Environmental Economics Research Hub Research Reports 10103, Environmental Economics Research Hub, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    5. Star, Megan & Rolfe, John & Barbi, Emily, 2019. "Do outcome or input risks limit adoption of environmental projects: Rehabilitating gullies in Great Barrier Reef catchments," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 73-82.

    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. Rolfe, John & Windle, Jill, 2010. "Do values for protecting iconic assets vary across populations? A Great Barrier Reef case study," Research Reports 95054, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    2. Concu, Giovanni B., 2007. "Investigating distance effects on environmental values: a choice modelling approach," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 51(2), pages 1-20.
    3. Rolfe, John & Windle, Jill, 2008. "Testing for differences in benefit transfer values between state and regional frameworks," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 52(2), pages 1-20.
    4. John Rolfe & Jill Windle, 2010. "Assessing national values to protect the health of the Great Barrier Reef," Environmental Economics Research Hub Research Reports 1072, Environmental Economics Research Hub, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    5. John Rolfe & Jill Windle, 2010. "Do values for protecting iconic assets vary across populations? A Great Barrier Reef case study," Environmental Economics Research Hub Research Reports 1065, Environmental Economics Research Hub, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    6. Windle, Jill & Rolfe, John & Brouwer, Roy, 2009. "Public values for improved water security for domestic and environmental use," Research Reports 94818, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    7. Bergstrom, John C. & Taylor, Laura O., 2006. "Using meta-analysis for benefits transfer: Theory and practice," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 351-360, December.
    8. Windle, Jill & Rolfe, John, 2013. "The limitations of applying benefit transfer to assess the value of ecosystem services in a “generic” peri-urban, coastal town in Australia," 2013 Conference (57th), February 5-8, 2013, Sydney, Australia 152183, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    9. Johnston, Robert J. & Ramachandran, Mahesh & Schultz, Eric T. & Segerson, Kathleen & Besedin, Elena Y., 2011. "Characterizing Spatial Pattern in Ecosystem Service Values when Distance Decay Doesn’t Apply: Choice Experiments and Local Indicators of Spatial Association," 2011 Annual Meeting, July 24-26, 2011, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 103374, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    10. Neville D Crossman & Jeffrey D Connor & Brett A Bryan & David A Summers & John Ginnivan, 2009. "Reconfiguring an Irrigation Landscape to Improve Provision of Ecosystem Services," Socio-Economics and the Environment in Discussion (SEED) Working Paper Series 2009-07, CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems.
    11. Black, Andrew & Colombo, Sergio & Hanley, Nick & Tinch, Dugald & Aftab, Ashar & Bergmann, E. Ariel, 2006. "Transferring the Benefits of Water Quality Enhancements in Small Catchments," 2006 Annual Meeting, August 12-18, 2006, Queensland, Australia 25790, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    12. Rolfe, John & Brouwer, Roy, 2011. "Testing for value stability with a meta-analysis of choice experiments: River health in Australia," Research Reports 107744, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    13. Dyack, Brenda & Connor, Jeffery D. & Hatton MacDonald, Darla, 2005. "Screening options and setting priorities for River Murray floodplains," 2005 Conference (49th), February 9-11, 2005, Coff's Harbour, Australia 137858, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    14. Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2005. "Australasian environmental economics: contributions, conflicts and ‘cop-outs’," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 49(3), pages 1-19.
    15. Kasia Mazur & Jeff Bennett, 2009. "Scale and scope effects on communities’ values for environmental improvements in the Namoi catchment: A choice modelling approach," Environmental Economics Research Hub Research Reports 0942, Environmental Economics Research Hub, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    16. Penn, Jerrod & Hu, Wuyang, 2017. "The Presence of Hypothetical Bias within Spatial Decay and Charismatic Species: An Application of Monarch and Viceroy Butterflies," 2017 Annual Meeting, July 30-August 1, Chicago, Illinois 258204, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    17. Hajkowicz, Stefan, 2006. "Multi-attributed environmental index construction," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(1), pages 122-139, April.
    18. Marit Kragt & Jeff Bennett, 2008. "Designing Choice Experiments to Test for Anchoring and Framing Effects," Environmental Economics Research Hub Research Reports 0810, Environmental Economics Research Hub, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    19. Farquharson, Robert J. & Kelly, Jason A. & Welsh, Pam & Mazur, Kasia & Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2009. "Policy responses to invasive native species: issues of social and private benefits and costs," 2009 Conference (53rd), February 11-13, 2009, Cairns, Australia 48157, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    20. Baker, Rick & Ruting, Brad, 2014. "Environmental Policy Analysis: A Guide to Non‑Market Valuation," 2014 Conference (58th), February 4-7, 2014, Port Macquarie, Australia 165810, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Environmental Economics and Policy;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ags:eerhrr:96384. 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: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/asanuau.html .

    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.