Farmers' Heterogeneous Willingness to Pay for Farmland Non-Market Goods and Services on the Basis of a Mixed Logit Model-A Case Study of Wuhan, China.

Yang Yang,Zhang Zhang

doi:10.3390/ijerph16203876

Abstract

The exploration of different stakeholders’ heterogeneous willingness to pay for farmland ecological value is a fundamental part of understanding the total value of farmland protection and designing a scientific farmland protection policy. Unlike the homogenous assumption used in the previous studies, the mixed logit model of choice experiment method was applied to estimate respondents’ heterogeneous willingness to pay for farmland non-market value (represented by farmland area, farmland fertility, water quality, air quality, species richness, and recreational value) in this study. Data came from a sample of 289 farmers in Wuhan, China who were face-to-face interviewed. Results showed that: (1) Farmers were unsatisfied with the status quo of the present farmland ecological environment and were willing to pay to preserve all the attributes of farmland non-market value. (2) Farmers had a heterogeneous preference for the status quo and recreational value—the error variances of these two attributes were both significant at the 1% level, and their willingness to pay for the farmland non-market value in Wuhan was 1141.88 Yuan/hm2. (3) Farmers’ cognition degree of farmland importance and whether respondents bought medical insurance or not had significant impacts on their willingness to pay. The results can provide the basic foundation for accurate valuation of farmland non-market services, help farmland regulators make the right farmland conversion decisions, and improve the resource allocation efficiency of local financial expenditure during farmland protection in Wuhan.

Highlights

Farmland provides humans with economic value, such as food and fiber material, and with a secure range of environmental public services, such as open space conservation, fresh air, flood protection, preserving wildlife habitat, and biodiversity [1,2,3,4]
Farmers’ cognition of farmland multifunction was investigated, as it can help respondents have a basic understanding of the farmland protection problems in this paper, which is useful for the choices they make
The CM model gives the different values of every farmland non-market value attribute; policymakers can allocate the limited capital to the attribute that has higher weight in their utility function, improving the resource allocation efficiency of local financial expenditure

Summary

Introduction

Farmland provides humans with economic value, such as food and fiber material, and with a secure range of environmental public services, such as open space conservation, fresh air, flood protection, preserving wildlife habitat, and biodiversity [1,2,3,4]. Large amounts of chemical fertilizer and pesticides have been abused by farmers in China to guarantee the national grain production and effective supply of agricultural products. This kind of high input–output tillage model has led to serious environmental problems, such as soil erosion, food security crisis, and unsustainable farmland development, among others [9,10,11,12], imposing severe threats to the safety. Public Health 2019, 16, 3876; doi:10.3390/ijerph16203876 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

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