Swapping Forests to Preserve Valuable Sites: A Sketch of a Framework for Economic Evaluation

This study employs a panel dataset on forest area of 22 countries and for the time period 1995–2016 in order to provide an up-todate assessment on determinants of forest area change. Our set of explanatory variables is drawn from the Environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis and well-established factors affecting forest area change. In this respect, macroeconomic stability, socioeconomic development

Public Expenditure Effectiveness for Biodiversity Conservation: Understanding the Trends for Project Tiger in India

This study investigates farmer preferences for banana diversity in Sri Lanka. First, it investigate farmers' attitudes towards banana cultivation in the country. Secondly, it also estimate diversity selection models to identify the important factors that contribute to the conservation of banana diversity. The analysis uses survey data covering 450 banana growers in three different districts representing

Preventing Peatland Fires in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia: The Role of Economic Incentives and Social Norms

Selected papers in this special issue of “Natural capital and ecosystem service: Sustainable forest management and climate change†in the Journal of Forest Economics include contributions to provide guidance to policy-makers and government officials in designing new policy scenarios for sustainable forest management.

Consequences of Discount Rate Selection for Financial and Ecological Expectation and Risk in Forest Management

In this note, we consider a case when a forestry property may lose its market value through “political risk”, illustrated here by it being classified as containing a key biotope. If a key biotope is found on a forest property in Sweden, the wood is almost impossible to sell. We show how the Faustmann formula is modified in this case and identify a “balance sheet” effect and document the incentive properties

Paired Stated Preference Methods for Valuing Management of White Pine Blister Rust: Order Effects and Outcome Uncertainty

This study uses individual survey data to investigate the impact of information about hiking destinations on estimated wilderness values in a spatial context. The data is derived from a revealed preference survey of backcountry visitors who responded to questions about their recreation behavior in the San Jacinto Wilderness of southern California. Two GIS data layers are developed showing spatial representations

Large carnivores are keystone species but represent economic costs to hunters. In Sweden, carnivore territories generally overlap with hunting areas, and as a result, conflicts occur because of the competition for prey. The wolf, lynx, and brown bear are protected species by law but are hunted when authorities allocate license hunting quotas. The aim of these quotas is to limit carnivore numbers. We

The forest-based sectors are in a period of significant transition due to climate change mitigation efforts, changes in forest products demand and other external mega-trends. This study applies a three-step Delphi process to identify the main drivers and formulate possible scenarios for the development of the Norwegian forest sector towards 2040. The impacts of these scenarios are analyzed with a partial

Natural disasters such as a hurricane can result in massive timber loss in a forested region. Timber prices in the affected region can drop sharply at the beginning and then recover gradually. In this study, the determinants of timber price recovery and the magnitudes of their contributions are analyzed through a partial equilibrium displacement model. Hurricane Hugo of 1989 is used to calibrate the

The impact of information release from public report announcements has been widely investigated in many commodity markets, but little attention has been paid to the lumber market. In this paper, we use generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) models to examine the effect of two housing market reports, namely the New Residential Construction (Housing Starts) and the New Residential

Using a partial equilibrium model of the Swedish forest sector, this study analyzes the impacts of an increasing bioenergy production on the timber harvest and forest growing stock. The impacts on ...

Deforestation from timber harvests and farmland conversions have led to 565 GtCO2 (billion tons of carbon dioxide) being emitted into the atmosphere. Taking into account natural regeneration on forestland, Houghton (2003, 2008) and Houghton et al. (2012) estimate that deforestation has caused a net loss of 484 GtCO2 since 1900 which is about one third of all manmade emissions. However, these estimates

Structural economic optimization models of the forestry and land use sectors can be used to develop baseline projections of future forest carbon stocks and annual fluxes, which inform policy dialog and investment in programs that maintain or enhance forest carbon stocks. Such analyses vary in terms of the degree of spatial, temporal, and activity-level aggregation used to represent forest resources

A Shared Socio-economic Pathway Approach to Assessing the Future of the New Zealand Forest Sector

In this study, we investigate the effects of climate change mitigation and socioeconomic development on global forest resources use. The analysis is based on the Global Biosphere Management Model (GLOBIOM), which is a recursive dynamic land-use model. Climate change mitigation and socioeconomic development are included in the model as exogenous parameters taken from the SSP-RCP scenarios, which separate

This special issue provides a broad range of potential methodologies, based in economics, for projecting forest carbon stocks. Papers included highlight new analyses from various economists that have projected carbon fluxes nationally and globally. Through carefully designed research, these authors have provided deep insights into methods that can be applied broadly.

This paper uses Monte Carlo methods and regression analysis to assess the role of uncertainty in yield function and land supply elasticity parameters on land use, carbon, and market outcomes in a long-term dynamic model of the global forest sector. The results suggest that parametric uncertainty has little influence on projected future timber prices and global output, but it does have important implications

In recent decades, the carbon sink provided by the U.S. forest sector has offset a sizable portion of domestic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In the future, the magnitude of this sink has important implications not only for projected U.S. net GHG emissions under a reference case but also for the cost of achieving a given mitigation target. The larger the contribution of the forest sector towards reducing

This study examines how natural disturbance can adversely affect the carbon sequestration potential of the forest, and the potential contribution that genomics might make towards offsetting these impacts when carbon is priced. A stochastic dynamic programming model of the BC interior, which includes a detailed carbon accounting module, shows that harvests are delayed as carbon prices rise, with less

From Source to Sink: Past Changes and Model Projections of Carbon Sequestration in the Global Forest Sector

This paper presents a series of narratives that can be used to define possible future trends in the global forest sector across the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), which we refer to as Forest Sector Pathways (FSPs). SSPs are part of a new scenario framework established by the climate change research community that facilitate the integrated analysis of future climate impacts, vulnerabilities,

Forest sector models merge models of timber inputs and final wood products markets with biophysical models of forest dynamics to project forest futures. Comprehensive treatment of biophysical dynamics is required to address the product detail of timber markets and to track changes in forest carbon. We examine assumptions for existing Forest Inventory Projection Models and empirically examine the implications

Forest growth predictions are used to build expectations about the future economic performance of management decisions. Faustmann land expectation value (LEV) is a widely used criterion in forestry to evaluate a diversity of decision parameters, such as rotation age and thinning regimes. Most of the predictions and, consequently, expectations are based on emperical knowledge, assuming a steady state

The sequestration of CO2 in forests is often suggested as a means to offset greenhouse gas emissions. New Zealand’s experience suggests the effects of government programmes to provide carbon credits to forest owners could be enhanced if forward markets, futures markets, or carbon-lending markets were used to manage risks. This paper provides a comparative institutions approach based on the history

Continuous-cover forestry is a management alternative that seeks to provide more diverse forests for continual multi-purpose benefits. Whether there is an economically-optimal equilibrium of uneven-aged forest can be tested deterministically by varying interest rate i. To answer this question, optimisation focused on maximising the net present value for the long-term period was performed using the

In this paper, we explore the role of biofuel production on deforestation in low- and middle-income countries. Since the 2000s, biofuel production has been rapidly developing to address issues of economic development, energy poverty and reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. However, the sustainability of biofuels is being challenged, particularly at the environmental level, due to their impact

Using Ireland as a case study, this study examines the economic drivers of the farm afforestation decision for individual farms. Farm incomes and characteristics are observed across the distribution of livestock farmers, using a longitudinal dataset. Potential agricultural and forest income streams are generated and compared in a life-cycle theoretical framework, while the inclusion of attitudinal

The emergence of second generation biofuel industries will be heavily dependent on future prices of ethanol, which could incent landowners to switch land uses from agriculture to growing biofuel feedstocks. In this study, we investigate price levels of ethanol that will be necessary for landowners to grow hybrid poplar. In such an emerging industry, landowners will face a great deal of uncertainty