Estimating the Young Generation’s Willingness to Pay (WTP) for PM 2.5 Control in Daegu, Korea, and Beijing, China

Peng Ning and Sang-Ho Lee
Additional contact information
Peng Ning: International Environmental Cooperation Center, Beijing 100035, China
Sang-Ho Lee: Department of Food Economics and Service, Yeungnam University, Gyeongsan 38541, Korea

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 20, 1-20

Abstract: This research aimed to examine the willingness to pay (WTP) of the young generation (the age group from 18 to 29) for the participatory solutions and actions on fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) pollution control and abatement in Daegu, Korea, and Beijing, China. This study found out that Korean respondents and Chinese respondents shared a wide range of similarities, both in terms of socio-demographic characters like age, family size, and house/apartment ownership, as well as a number of perceptions related to environmental and social responsibilities. Around one-third of the Korean respondents and one-fifth of the Chinese respondents expressed negative WTP due to primary reasons such as lack of trust in the effectiveness of PM 2.5 control measures (Korea) and limitation of budget (China). The mean estimated values of WTP with and without explanatory variables in Korea were merely slightly higher than those in China. The mean WTP without control variables in Korea was 11,882.97 KRW/month (10.61 USD/month) and the one in China was 65.09 CNY/month (9.48 USD/month). The mean WTP with explanatory variables for Daegu, Korea, was KRW 11,982.33 (USD 10.70) per person per month, and the one for Beijing, China, was CNY 64.84 (USD 9.40) per person per month. The annual total WTP for Daegu, Korea, was assessed around KRW 47572 million (USD 42.45 million), whereas the estimated total WTP for Beijing, China, was around CNY 3260.14 million (USD 474.94 million) per year. Based on the results and the findings, this study proposes to further strengthen the comprehensive cooperation between China and Korea in the field of air quality improvement, with a particular focus on PM 2.5 control and abatement and cooperation in academic circles and among the general public.

Keywords: willingness to pay; WTP; contingent valuation method; CVM; fine particulate matter; PM 2.5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/20/5704/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/20/5704/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:20:p:5704-:d:276874

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().