Value evaluation and ecological compensation of endangered species from the perspective of stakeholders: A cases study with Elaeagnus mollise

Abstract

The value evaluation of endangered species can provide important supports for policy-making in biodiversity conservation. We evaluated the stakeholders' preference and willingness to pay (WTP) from the perspective of stakeholders by the choice experiment method (CEM) and discussed the ecological compensation mechanism, with Elaeagnus mollis, a national secondary key protected plant as an example. Based on the interest demands analysis of three stakeholders, the management departments, enterprises and farmers, we measured five species attributes of E. mollis, including planting area, product classification, seedling varieties, protection investment, and far-mers' income. Furthermore, the preference of stakeholders and WTP for different attribute variables were analyzed using random parameter model (RPL). The results showed that the preference of respondents for the variable of "increase investment in protection" was the strongest and WTP was the highest (331.00 yuan·a-1·household-1). The stakeholders had stronger preference for the variables of "simultaneous development of high and low-end products" and "development of high-end products", with WTP being 242.71 and 227.57 yuan·a-1·household-1, respectively. For the variables of "farmers' income", "unchanged investment in protection", "seedling varieties" and "planting area", stakeholders showed certain preference and WTP from strong to weak. The prefe-rence for "no investment in protection" and "development of low-end products" was weaker and the WTP was negative. Through direct and indirect approaches of compensation, ecological compensation could be implemented for the objects of ecological compensation (E. mollis and associated habitat). The value of compensating surplus (CS) calculated was 285.62 yuan·a-1·household-1.