Contingent Valuation Assessment of the Economic Damages of Pollution to Marine Recreational Fishing

摘要

The research performed under this cooperative agreement is summarized in the contents of four papers. The first is on 'The Determinants of Value for a Marine Estuarine Sportfishery: The Effects of Water Quality in Texas Bays'. The objective is to formulate special statistical models that produce estimates of each individual's willingness to pay for access to the recreational fishery in the eight major bays along the Texas Gulf Coast. The second paper is on 'Combining Contingent Valuation and Travel Cost Data for the Valuation of Non-Market Goods.' The primary methodological innovation in the paper is to combine both travel cost and discrete choice contingent valuation data in one comprehensive model. The paper also breaks new ground by freeing up certain parameter restrictions within the jointly estimated model so that the travel cost and contingent valuation data are allowed to imply different preferences. Finally, the third and fourth reports are applications. The first is called 'Using the Basic 'Auto-Validation' Model to Assess the Effect of Environmental Quality on Texas Recreational Fishing Demand: Welfare Estimates' and the second is called, 'The Effects of Variations in Gamefish Abundance on Texas Recreational Fishing Demand: Welfare Estimates.'