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A timber truck fully loaded with logs drives over a very simple wooden bridge in a forest.
© Thünen-Institut
A timber truck fully loaded with logs drives over a very simple wooden bridge in a forest.
Institute of

WF Forestry

New publication on the economic value of forests for nature protection and landscape quality

Environmental services of forests often are public goods for which market prices do not exist. Their economic value however can be empirically determined with the help of suitable methods.

© Matthias Rütze

Using one of these methods – a discrete choice experiment – we elicit the willingness to pay (WTP) of the German population for potential changes of eight structural characteristics of forests. Results of the monetary valuation show: positive WTP values exist for increasing the share of forests, increasing biodiversity, increasing the harvest age of forests and maintaining some unused forest areas.
Large negative WTP values are found for decreasing the share of forests, changing the amount of coniferous trees to 70%, and increasing the amount of trees from other countries. Results are relatively robust to different model specifications, mainly regarding the signs of the preference parameters.

  • Weller, P, Elsasser, P (2018): Preferences for forest structural attributes in Germany – evidence from a choice experiment. Forest Policy and Economics 93, page 1-9. doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2018.04.013
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