Estimating the Recreation Value of Ecosystems by Using a Travel Cost Method Approach

Recreation is one of the ecosystem’s secondary values of a well conserved natural ecosystem, associated with the direct use individuals make of these natural assets. In this paper we define and estimate the total economic recreation value to visitors of a particular natural area, a national park. An on-site individual observation Travel Cost Model, Count Data distributions, and a version of hyperbolic discounting framework distribution were used to estimate a measure for the present recreation use of the site and the total discounted recreation value for a 50 years period. The empirical estimates of the average representative visitor’s present equivalent surplus willingness to pay, based on the impact assumption of closure or loss of access to the park were 123 € per day per visit, and 593 € per each average five days length visit, per visitor. These values suggest that recreation use of nature has a higher value than certain economic activities in the area.Recreation Use Value; Ecosystem; Estimation; Travel Cost Method; Welfare Measures; Count Data Models.

Measuring the Social Recreation Per-Day Net Benefit of Wildlife Amenities of a National Park: A Count-Data Travel Cost Approach

We applied count-data travel cost methods to a truncated sample of visitors, to estimate the average CS per each day of visit of an individual, visiting the Peneda- Gerês National Park to enjoy their natural facilities for recreation purposes. As the recreation demand was measured in number of days of stay in the park the behaviour of the dependent variable is very specific. To overcome this situation, we propose the use of altered truncated count data models or truncated count data models on grouped data because we found they were better adjusted to our data set. The average individual CS per day is estimated to be €194 varying between €116 and €448, with Simulated Limits. This information is useful in the formulation of government policy relating directly to national parks and conservation and the determination of future natural park management. To our knowledge this is the first attempt to measure the average recreation net benefits per each day of stay supported by a national park, by using truncated altered and truncated grouped count data Travel Cost Model based on the observation of individual (not household) number of days of stay. Key words: Social Recreation Benefits; Wildlife Amenities; Count Data Models; Travel Cost.

Effects of Immigration on Intra-Industry Trade: A logit analysis

This study estimates the effects of the immigration stock, as well as those of immigrants’ characteristics, such as having the same language as that of the host country and the level of qualification or entrepreneurship, on Portuguese intra-industry trade (IIT) by types, controlling for the effects of other socio-economic factors, like economic dimensions, price indexes and distance. In addition to the member-countries of the EU-27, the group of countries studied includes five African countries with Portuguese as their official language, known as the PALOPs, and the BRIC countries. Since indexes are fractional variables, the pseudo-likelihood Logit estimator was used on the panel data to obtain the empirical results. The study found that an increase of the immigrant stock will produce an increment in the trade indexes considered and this effect is enhanced if immigrants originate from a country where Portuguese is the official language, or if they are highly qualified, whereas immigrant entrepreneurs have no significant effect.Immigration; trade; skills; entrepreneurship; panel data; Portugal. Classification-C33, F11, F12, F22.

MIXED LOGIT ESTIMATION OF RADICAL ISLAMIC TERRORISM IN EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

This paper estimates what characteristics (e.g. location, number of casualties, and type of attack) are associated with an Islamic terrorist attack. This is established by identifying the significant determinants of the probability that an attack had been carried out by Islamic terrorists. For Europe, the United States, and Canada, the analysis employs ITERATE data from October 1979 to December 2002 to ascertain the significant characteristics of Islamic terrorist attacks. A random- parameter logit model is used to analyze the probability of such attacks, taking into account the heterogeneity of the sample data. This model outperforms the standard logit model. Some policy implications are presented.Islamic radical terrorism, mixed logit model, and public policy

Testing the link specification in binary choice models. A semiparametric approach.

Doutoramento em Matemática

Estimating the recreation value of ecosystems by using a travel cost method approach

Recreation is one of the ecosystem's secondary values of a well conserved natural ecosystem, associated with the direct use individuals make of these natural assets. In this paper we define and estimate the total economic recreation value to visitors of a particular natural area, a national park. An on-site individual observation Travel Cost Model, Count Data distributions, and a version of hyperbolic discounting framework distribution were used to estimate a measure for the present recreation use of the site and the total discounted recreation value for a 50 years period. The empirical estimates of the average representative visitor's present equivalent surplus willingness to pay, based on the impact assumption of closure or loss of access to the park were 123 € per day per visit, and 593 € per each average five days length visit, per visitor. These values suggest that recreation use of nature has a higher value than certain economic activities in the area

Measuring the social recreation per-day net benefit of wildlife amenities of a national park : a count-data travel cost approach

We applied count-data travel cost methods to a truncated sample of visitors, to estimate the average CS per each day of visit of an individual, visiting the Peneda-Gerês National Park to enjoy their natural facilities for recreation purposes. As the recreation demand was measured in number of days of stay in the park the behaviour of the dependent variable is very specific. To overcome this situation, we propose the use of altered truncated count data models or truncated count data models on grouped data because we found they were better adjusted to our data set. The average individual CS per day is estimated to be €194 varying between €116 and €448, with Simulated Limits. This information is useful in the formulation of government policy relating directly to national parks and conservation and the determination of future natural park management. To our knowledge this is the first attempt to measure the average recreation net benefits per each day of stay supported by a national park, by using truncated altered and truncated grouped count data Travel Cost Model based on the observation of individual (not household) number of days of stay

FDI Spillovers at Regional Level: Evidence from Portugal

This paper aims to establish whether geographical proximity between the locations of multinational firms and domestic firms facilitates the occurrence of FDI spillovers. Using data for Portugal, this hypothesis is clearly confirmed. However, the impact varies according to whether the externalities considered are horizontal or vertical. In the first case, the impact is negative, which may result from the competition effect at regional level. With regard to vertical externalities, a positive impact through backward linkages is observed. These results raise important implications for the definition of economic policies aiming to attract FDI and promote regional development.vertical spillovers; horizontal spillovers; multinational firms productivity; FDI.

Productivity Spillovers from Multinational Corporations in the Portuguese Case: Evidence from a Short Time Period Panel Data

Empirical evidence on productivity spillovers - a concept that embodies the fact that foreign enterprises own intangible assets which can be transmitted to domestic firms, thus raising their productivity level - is ambiguous. With a panel data set at the firm level for the Portuguese manufacturing industry, we aim to uncover the possibility that the choice of statistical techniques will have profound effects on evidence of spillovers diffusion. We will consider the panel data models commonly used in the literature and the recent and more robust Extended GMM technique, specially devised for panels with a small number of time periods. We find that positive spillovers occur only when the technologic gap between domestic and foreign firms is moderate. Though all methods agree on this result. there are differences worth to be noted, revealing that the traditional estimates can sometimes be misleading.Domestic firm productivity; multinational corporations; Portugal; technological spillovers; panel data; Extended GMM.

The Spatial Dimension in FDI Spillovers: Evidence at the Regional Level from Portugal

There are theoretical reasons to expect that benefits to domestic firms from foreign direct investment would be confined to the area where the multinational firm is located and that the benefits depend on the development level of the host region. However, there is a scarcity of empirical studies on FDI’s indirect effects at the regional level, particularly with regard to inter-industry spillovers. This paper is an empirical contribution to this literature with data for Portugal. Both intra-industry and inter-industry FDI spillovers are considered. The concept of region adopted comprises the county in which the domestic firm is located, together with all of the directly neighbouring counties. Equations are estimated using the System GMM, with robust estimation of covariance matrices. Data confirms the relevance of both the geographical proximity and the development level of the region to this phenomenon. Furthermore, FDI spillovers are more evident at the inter-industry level. These results raise important implications for economic policy.Portugal, FDI intra-industry spillovers, FDI inter-industry spillovers, counties, regional development level, geographical proximity.