Forest owners' preferences for contract-based management to enhance environmental values versus timber production

Juutinen, Artti; Kurttila, Mikko; Pohjanmies, Tähti; Tolvanen, Anne; Kuhlmey, Katharina; Skudnik, Mitja; Triplat, Matevž; Westin, Kerstin; Mäkipää, Raisa

doi:10.1016/j.forpol.2021.102587

Cited by 26 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 39 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…It is possible that people living near hydropowerregulated rivers are accustomed to the river's ecological state and hence do not value its improvement as much. In addition, consistent with risk aversion (Kahneman and Tversky 1979;Tversky and Kahneman 1991), people tend to value deterioration in absolute terms more than improvement in an attribute (Ahtiainen et al 2015;Juutinen et al 2021).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Estimating the economic value of hydropeaking externalities in regulated rivers

Ruokamo

Juutinen

Ashraf

et al. 2022

Preprint

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Hydropower is a flexible form of electricity generation providing both baseload and balancing power to accommodate intermittent renewables in the energy mix. However, hydropower also generates various externalities. This study investigates individuals’ preferences for policies aiming to reduce short-term regulations (i.e., hydropeaking in regulated rivers) while accounting for associated externalities with a discrete choice experiment. This is the first valuation study focusing on hydropeaking that considers both negative and positive externalities. The results imply that most individuals prefer stronger restrictions on short-term regulations to mitigate local environmental impacts. Individuals especially value improvements in recreational use, fish stocks, and the ecological state. On the other hand, potential increases in CO2 emissions are linked with a clear disutility. The estimated benefits obtained from an improved state of the river environment due to such restrictions probably exceed the disutility caused by increased CO2 emissions. The results also reveal unobserved preference heterogeneity among individuals, which should be accounted for in the willingness-to-pay (WTP) estimation using a model specification with correlated utility coefficients. Overall, the findings can inform policy-makers and environmental managers on the economic value of hydropeaking externalities and further guide the sustainable management of rivers regulated for hydropower generation.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Estimating the economic value of hydropeaking externalities in regulated rivers

Ruokamo

Juutinen

Ashraf

et al. 2022

Preprint

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…This paper is based on the Swedish data from a questionnaire survey directed at small-scale, private forest owners in five European countries (see Juutinen et al 2021). In Sweden, the survey was conducted as a postal survey from February through April, 2020, via the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU).…”

Section: Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Swedish Forest Owners’ Values and Objectives on Management Practices and Forest Policy Accomplishment

Lindgren

Westin

2023

Small-scale Forestry

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Swedish forestry policy principles rest on voluntarism and a mutual interest among forest owners, the industry, and the state that timber production continuously be kept at a high level at the same time as environmental goals are achieved. An estimated 313,000 small-scale forest owners own half of Sweden’s forestland, and thus their objectives and values, and how these impact their management behavior, are matters of national policy interest. From a survey targeting a random sample of small-scale Swedish forest owners (n = 652), we found that overall forest owners found consumption objectives to be more important than production objectives. In line with this, they perceived social values, such as recreation, to be more important than economic values. Yet, on an aggregate level, timber production goals were fulfilled. Further, most forest owners left some of their productive forest untouched and applied restoration management, which could be interpreted as either intentional or unintentional considerations of the environmental goals. However, the environmental goals were not met on a national level. It can therefore be concluded that the voluntariness of the current forest policy seems to work when supported by the market’s interest in and mechanism for timber production but fails when only “soft” instruments such as information campaigns, advisory services, and education are at hand to promote environmental goals. Additional economic incentives, such as payment schemes, might be required.

show abstract

“…more time dedication) were more likely to agree with a subsidy policy than those who spent less time on forest activities or those who are not directly dedicated to their forest. The latter might show a stronger interest in a system aimed at the provision of public goods that are not efficiently provided by markets, as they are often more interested in environmental than monetary benefits (Juutinen et al, 2021;Lawrence, 2018;Mostegl et al, 2019).…”

Section: Distribution Of Subsidies Per Size Class Of Forest Holdingsmentioning

confidence: 99%