A travel cost assessment of the demand for recreationin Swiss forests

Nicolas Borzykowski (), Andrea Baranzini and David Maradan
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Nicolas Borzykowski: University of Neuchatel, Institute of Economic Research, 2 rue A.-L. Breguet,Neuchatel CH-2000, Switzerland et University of Applied Sciences Western Switzerland (HES-SO), Haute ́Ecole de Gestion Gen`eve(HEG-Ge), 17 rue de la Tambourine, Carouge CH-1227, Switzerland
David Maradan: University of Applied Sciences Western Switzerland (HES-SO), Haute ́Ecole de Gestion Gen`eve(HEG-Ge), 17 rue de la Tambourine, Carouge CH-1227, Switzerland

Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, 2017, vol. 98, issue 3, 149-171

Abstract: This paper analyzes the demand for recreation in Swiss forests using theindividual travel cost method. We apply a two-steps approach, i.e., a hurdle zero-truncated negative binomial model, that allows accounting for a large number of non-visitors caused by the off-site phone survey and over-dispersion. Given the nationalscale of the survey, we group forest zones to assess consumer surpluses and travelcost elasticities for relatively homogeneous forest types. We find that forest recreationactivities are travel cost inelastic and show that recreation in Swiss forests provideslarge benefits to the population. The most populated area is associated with greaterconsumer surpluses, but the lack of recreational infrastructure may cause a lowerrecreational benefit in some zones. For these zones, recreational benefits may belower than costs caused by maintenance. More efficient management would requireeither improving recreational infrastructure thus increasing benefits, or switching theforest status from recreational to biodiversity forest hence decreasing managementcosts.

Keywords: Travel; cost; method·Hurdle; zero-truncated; negative; binomial·Forestrecreation·Switzerland (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Journal Article: A travel cost assessment of the demand for recreation in Swiss forests (2017)
Journal Article: A travel cost assessment of the demand for recreation in Swiss forests (2017)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:rae:jouraf:v:98:y:2017:i:3:p:149-171

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