The WTP for property rights for the Giant Panda: can a charismatic species be an instrument for conservation of natural habitat?

The paper presents the results from a stated preference study to address issues concerning the potential for using flag-ship species, such as the Giant Panda, to purchase the property rights for the conservation of natural habitat. The study finds, first, that there is clear WTP for acquiring the property rights for panda habitat. The nature of this demand is found both convincing and logically coherent in that it is an increasing function of land (at a diminishing rate). Secondly, the study decomposed the elicited values into genetic stock, animal welfare and implicit biodiversity values. The results show that the latter type of value consist of almost half of total value implying that the Panda is in fact a potential instrument for greater biodiversity conservation. Thirdly, the study shows that these implicit biodiversity values are dependent on the preservation of the flagship species itself, implying that the panda is not only a potential instrument for habitat conservation, but a necessary one. Finally, the extent to which the flagship approach can be capable of contributing to wider biodiversity conservation is discussed

Valuing forest ecosystem services and disservices - Case study of a protected area in India

This study estimates the value of forest ecosystem services provided by a protected area in a biodiversity hotspot in India. It also addresses some of the shortcomings identified in existing literature by estimating the value of several intangible benefits, and disservices of forests ignored in most valuation studies, as well as the added value from intact forests as compared to from alternative landscapes. Using primary and secondary data, and economic valuation techniques the study shows that the total net benefits provided by the Nagarhole national park in Karnataka, India are considerable. The added value of benefits from the park is also higher as compared to from alternative landscapes considering just three ecosystem services. If these are factored in decision making it could strengthen the economic case for conserving forests in tropical countries such as India where there is immense pressure to divert forests for meeting development needs.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier via http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoser.2016.05.00

The behavioural effect of electronic home energy reports: Evidence from a randomised field trial in the United States

Behavioural interventions, such as informational nudges, have become an increasingly popular strategy in demand-side energy management. In particular, home energy reports (HERs) have been used to induce behavioural change among residential consumers. These HERs typically provide peer comparisons of energy use and information about energy savings opportunities. Despite the growing prevalence of HERs and a shift from postal to electronic delivery of HERs, the experimental evidence base of their effectiveness comes primarily from HERs delivered by post from a single vendor (Opower). Whether that evidence generalises to other programmes and to the electronic delivery of HERs is unclear. This paper reports new evidence for HER effectiveness from a 12-month field experiment with approximately 9,000 households that tested electronic HER programme in a deregulated American residential electricity market. Despite high non-compliance with HER delivery, the programme reduced household electricity consumption by 2.9%, 95% CI [-5.0%, -0.76%]. This estimated reduction is consistent with prior estimated impacts of HERs delivered by post and implies electronic HERs are at least as effective as reports delivered by post in reducing electricity consumption, while they are administered at a lower cost

What is the Nature and Social Norm within the Context of In-Group Favouritism?

In-group favouritism behaviour is observed everywhere around the world and previous research has shown that this behaviour is also easily triggered in a laboratory in various contexts. However, little is known about why different magnitudes of in-group favouritism are observed across societies. In this paper, we use a new allocation experiment to examine the nature of social norms within the context of in-group favouritism behaviour. In this experiment, a decision-maker has to decide only once how to allocate a fixed amount of resource between each of the three members of her own group and each of the three members of the out-group, whilst the decision- maker's own payoff is not affected by her decision. Three treatments are implemented: in the first treatment, only the members of the in-group can punish the decision-maker. In the second treatment, only the members of the out-group can punish the decision-maker. Finally, in the third treatment, only an independent third-party observer can punish the decision-maker. The aim of these treatments is to test whether there is a prevailing social norm which dominates the behavioural standard within the context of in-group favouritism and whether this mechanism varies across different subject pools, namely Thailand and the UK. Compared to a baseline treatment with no punishment opportunity, we observed that among the Thai subjects in-group favouritism significantly increased once the in-group members were given the opportunity to punish the decision-maker. The threat of punishment from a third-party punisher also increased in-group favouritism in Thailand. However, when only the out-group members had the opportunity to punish, no change in in-group favouritism behaviour was observed. On the contrary, within the British subject pool, when the out-group members had the opportunity to punish the decision-maker, we observed a decline in in-group favouritism as well as a marked shift towards an equitable outcome. The threats of punishments from the in-group members and the third-party, on the other hand, did not have any impact on in-group favouritism behaviour in the UK. The results suggest that within the Thai subject pool, there appears to be a prevailing `in-group bias norm' which is strongly enforced within and outside the group. Within the UK subject pool, however, it is less clear what the prevailing norm is. Whilst the threat of punishment from the out-group members who directly lose out from favouritism behaviour appeared to significantly reduce this behaviour, an uninvolved third-party was not willing to incur a cost to punish this behaviour. This interesting result indicates two possible explanations: first, in-group favouritism, in contrast to selfish or opportunistic behaviour, may not considered as a strong enough violation of a social norm; and second, the norm of egalitarianism within the context of favouritism may still be `evolving'.Third-party Punishmen

Essays on non-market valuation of environmental resources: policy and technical explorations.

This thesis consists of a portfolio of research papers examining key contemporary technical, methodological and policy issues on the use of non-market valuation in environmental decision-making. The introductory chapter provides a short discussion of the structure and general aims of the thesis. The rest of the thesis is divided into two parts. Part A (consisting of Chapters 2,3, and 4) contributes to the literature on the analysis and design of the two most commonly used stated preference methods, Contingent Valuation (CV) and Choice Modelling (CM). Chapter 2 examines the impacts of using alternative opt-out formats in CM studies, Chapter 3 presents a latent segmentation model as an alternative means of accounting for preference heterogeneity in discrete choice random utility models, while Chapter 4 introduces a generalised limited dependent variable modelling approach to account for non-trivial number of zero responses in open-ended type willingness to pay CV data. Part B (consisting of Chapters 5 and 6) contributes to the literature on the role of stated preferences in environmental policy and legal decisionmaking. Chapter 5 uses the CV method to examine the nature of wildlife values in the face of the ongoing policy debate between ex situ and in situ conservation. Lastly Chapter 6 seeks to assess the US experience with using non-market valuation in courts with the aim of providing suggestions as European legislators formulate the direction of the new EU environmental liability regime

The value of urban green space in Britain: A methodological framework for spatially referenced benefit transfer

Author version of article. The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10640-013-9665-8.© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013A meta-analysis of studies valuing urban greenspace in the UK is undertaken to yield spatially sensitive marginal value functions. A geographical information system (GIS) is used to apply these functions to spatial data detailing the location of such greenspace resources in five British cities and monetary values are computed. This procedure is repeated for the six future scenarios used in the UK National Ecosystem Assessment and changes in values calculated for the period 2010-60. These findings are then extrapolated to all major British cities to obtain per household and aggregate valuation estimates for each scenario both with and without distributional weights. While subject to a number of shortcomings in both data availability and methodology, this represents the first systematic and comprehensive attempt to value marginal changes in urban greenspace while accounting for spatial heterogeneity.Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC

Is it a norm to favour your own group?

This paper examines the relationship between norm enforcement and in-group favouritism behaviour. Using a new two-stage allocation experiment with punishments, we investigate whether in-group favouritism is considered as a social norm in itself or as a violation of a different norm, such as egalitarian norm. We find that which norm of behaviour is enforced depends on who the punisher is. If the punishers belong to the in-group, in-group favouritism is considered a norm and it does not get punished. If the punishers belong to the outgroup, in-group favouritism is frequently punished. If the punishers belong to no group and merely observe ingroup favouritism (the third-party), they do not seem to care sufficiently to be willing to punish this behaviour. Our results shed a new light on the effectiveness of altruistic norm enforcement when group identities are taken into account and help to explain why in-group favouritism is widespread across societies.This is the accepted manuscript. The final publication is available from Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10683-014-9417-9

Leveraging private investment to expand renewable power generation: Evidence on financial additionality and productivity gains from Uganda

Effectively mitigating climate change entails a quick upscaling and redirection of electricity infrastructure investment. Given that the bulk of greenhouse gas emissions increases until 2050 will come from low- and middle-income countries, finding cost-effective ways to mitigate climate change while meeting development targets is essential. However, recent research has shown some of the limitations of broad financing mechanisms, such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and existing carbon markets. This has resulted in a growing interest in designing novel investment support schemes, such as modifications of targeted feed-in-tariffs (FiTs) that may be more cost effective and better targeted towards particular outcomes when compared to traditional deployment subsidies or broad financing mechanisms. We evaluate the design and outcomes of one such novel support schemes: the GET FiT (Global Energy Transfer Feed-in Tariff) investment support scheme in Uganda, which has attracted ~ 453 million USD in private sector investment for 17 small-scale renewable energy projects (solar, hydro, bagasse) in only three years. Using financial modelling on detailed project-level data, we find that the majority of projects were additional and would therefore not have been built without the subsidy. In addition, using firm-level panel data, we show that power outages hamper manufacturing performance in Uganda. In the absence of reliable outage-data for the entire Ugandan territory, we use nightlight variations to proxy changes in outages. We show that outages have declined substantially since the introduction of GET FiT. Yet, our analysis also demonstrates that programmes to incentivise additional renewable generation in developing countries funded internationally or domestically should liaise closely with grid authorities to ensure that supply does not outstrip demand.European Union’s Horizon 2020 INNOPATHS project (Grant agreement no. 730403) The Department of Land Economy and the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Cambridge Heinrich Böll Foundation

Meta-Analysis of Livelihood Impacts of Payments for Environmental Services Programmes in Developing Countries

Payments for environmental services (PES) programmes have been widely promoted over the last few decades in many developing countries. Improving the livelihoods of environmental services (ES) suppliers is not only seen as a side benefit but is often considered a prerequisite for the viability of PES. Yet, the ability to draw ‘overview lessons’ over the impacts of PES on livelihoods from literature review studies remains limited. To overcome these shortcomings, we undertake a meta-analysis of causal statistical studies on the effects of PES on the livelihoods of ES suppliers in the developing world. The set-up of our meta-analysis allows us to draw more conservative but more reliable and generalisable overview lessons. Our findings suggest that PES programmes are likely to have positive but modest livelihood impacts on ES suppliers. Further, several institutional characteristics of PES are found to be correlated with more favourable livelihood impacts, such as high payments, high degree of voluntary participation, low transaction costs and better access to alternative income sources. Lastly, our results highlight the importance of controlling for unobservable confounders when undertaking original evaluation studies on the impacts of PES. These factors should be incorporated in the design, implementation and evaluation of PES

From personalized exchange towards anonymous trade: A field experiment on the workings of the invisible hand

The experimental literature has shown the tendency for experimental trading markets to converge to neoclassical predictions. Yet, the extent to which theory explains the equilibrating forces in markets remains under-researched, especially in the developing world. We set up a laboratory in 94 villages in rural Sierra Leone to mimic a real market. In this laboratory market, average efficiency of the within-village treatment is somewhat lower than predicted by theory (and observed in different contexts), and markets do not fully converge to theoretical predictions across rounds of trading. We also find that trading with strangers reduces efficiency, and that anonymized trade within the village does not affect efficiency. This points to the importance of behavioral norms for trade. Intra-village social relationships or hierarchies, instead, appear less important as determinants of trade. This is confirmed by analysis of the trader-level data, showing that individual earnings in the experiment do not vary with one’s status or position in local networks.We thank N.W.O. 452-04-333, N.W.O. 451-14-001 and Cambridge Conservation Initiative (CCI 05/101005) for financial support.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier via https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2016.10.01