Analyzing Beach Recreationists' Preferences for the Reduction of Jellyfish Blooms: Economic Results from a Stated-Choice Experiment in Catalonia, Spain.

Paulo A L D Nunes,Antonio Canepa,Laia Piñol,Louinord Voltaire,Maria L Loureiro,Sergio Sastre,Erik V Thuesen

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0126681

Abstract

Jellyfish outbreaks and their consequences appear to be on the increase around the world, and are becoming particularly relevant in the Mediterranean. No previous studies have quantified tourism losses caused by jellyfish outbreaks. We used a stated-choice questionnaire and a Random Utility Model to estimate the amount of time respondents would be willing to add to their journey, in terms of reported extra travel time, in order to reduce the risk of encountering jellyfish blooms in the Catalan coast. The estimation results indicated that the respondents were willing to spend on average an additional 23.8% of their travel time to enjoy beach recreation in areas with a lower risk of jellyfish blooms. Using as a reference the opportunity cost of time, we found that the subsample of individuals who made a trade-off between the disutility generated by travelling longer in order to lower the risk of jellyfish blooms, and the utility gained from reducing this risk, are willing to pay on average €3.20 per beach visit. This estimate, combined with the respondents’ mean income, yielded annual economic gains associated with reduction of jellyfish blooms on the Catalan coast around €422.57 million, or about 11.95% of the tourism expenditures in 2012. From a policy-making perspective, this study confirms the importance of the economic impacts of jellyfish blooms and the need for mitigation strategies. In particular, providing daily information using social media applications or other technical devices may reduce these social costs. The current lack of knowledge about jellyfish suggests that providing this information to beach recreationists may be a substantially effective policy instrument for minimising the impact of jellyfish blooms.

Highlights

Jellyfish are a natural feature of the Mediterranean, jellyfish blooms are recurring events that are an inconvenience for swimmers, with certain species being a significant health hazard [1]
After estimating the baseline conditional logit model (CL), we extend our empirical section by estimating a random parameters model (RPL), given that initially we are assuming that individuals’ preferences are homogenous, while it is more logical to expect that their preferences are heterogeneous
This means that the consumption of beach recreation opportunities is concentrated in a couple of hours, and the median respondent spends less than half a day at the beach

Summary

Introduction

Jellyfish are a natural feature of the Mediterranean, jellyfish blooms are recurring events that are an inconvenience for swimmers, with certain species being a significant health hazard [1]. The resulting socio-economic impacts, both direct (tourism) and indirect (coastal development, fisheries), have become tangible and significant. Coastal habitat degradation and climate change are amongst the most probable drivers [6], we still lack sufficient information on the economic impacts and consequences of these blooms. Very few studies report the impacts of jellyfish blooms on the economic sectors. Kim et al [10] estimated that the impacts of jellyfish blooms on Korea’s various fisheries ranged between 2.1% and 25% of the total value of the catches. Jellyfish blooms have many more consequences than those suffered by the fishing fleet, including potentially severe losses in the recreational sectors. Economic valuation of tourism and recreational losses due to jellyfish blooms is very limited or non-existent. The present paper addresses this gap and constitutes the first econometric valuation study of both market and non-market losses

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