Estimation of the marginal values of water as an instream resource for recreational fishing: a national analysis

Streamflow throughout the U.S. may be put to a variety of uses, some that involve the water's consumption (e.g., irrigation, municipal consumption, etc.) and others that use water as a public good (e.g., white water rafting, fishing, etc.). As consumptive water demands have grown and water has been allocated towards meeting these demands, the public use demands for water have also been growing. To insure the efficient allocation of our limited water supply, consideration must be given to water's value in each of its alternative uses.;This study focuses on estimating water's public use value as a fisheries resource. Though there are other public uses of streamflow, these, usually, are not improved after minimal flows are met. Therefore, benefits to the stream fisheries are expected to be the most significant marginal gain to society for an increase in streamflow.;Because water is a flow resource, the benefits generated by an acre-foot of water are as widespread as the course of the river. Thus, a household production model is formulated to describe the recreational fishing commodity production by households throughout the U.S. A tobit analysis of the household's commodity production (proxied by days fishing) indicates that the stream fishing resources are a very significant factor in the households' commodity production. The total population response (measured in days fishing) to an acre-foot change in streamflow for each drainage basin is derived by totaling the reactions of the affected individuals. With estimates on the value of a day of recreational fishing derived in previous analyses, the value of an acre-foot of water is derived for each river basin.