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Conservation easements offer sustainable land use and environmental conservation through land use restrictions. Opportunities exist to improve the efficiency by which parties interested in conservation easement transactions are matched, which may contribute to the overall protection of agricultural landscapes. This study utilizes stated choice questions to elicit preferences for conservation easements by both landowners, as potential easement suppliers, and land trust professionals as potential easement demanders. A random utility model is estimated for landowners and for land trust professionals. Results indicate both preference overlap and preference divergence between these two sets of respondents. Significant opportunities exist to reduce search and transactions costs, improve easement acceptance, and increase environmental protection via increased transaction frequency of conservation easements in this emerging market. When negotiating with landowners, land trusts need to be aware of concerns related to issues such as managerial control, public access, lack of trust, and financial compensation. Moreover, heterogeneity amongst participants regarding these issues suggests some agricultural landowners may be more or less concerned about these issues.

Agricultural lands offer an abundance of environmental goods and services, yet face residential development pressures. Conservation easements are frequently used to protect both productive land and environmental amenities. The landowner retains ownership, and may donate development rights or receive compensation for permanently limiting development on the property. Focus groups were conducted with agricultural landowners in Wyoming and Colorado to explore factors affecting their preferences for conservation easements. Results from the focus groups reveal that landowners have concerns about providing easements in perpetuity. They also considered public access to and loss of managerial control of their property as obstacles. Focus-group results indicated that landowners valued the provision of public goods, such as wildlife habitat and open space, to neighboring communities, and generally felt something important would be lost to their communities if their lands were developed. Addressing landowner concerns could potentially increase the volume of easement transactions.

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