Ghana’s Elmina Beach and Economic Welfare Improvement

Beach resources have been a source of income for many economies around the world. Even though Ghanaian beaches are not well developed and sometimes suffer from abuse, they are quite well patronized by both local and non-local pleasure seekers. Currently there is generally no fee charged for recreational access to the vast expanse of Ghanaian beaches, which remain largely undeveloped open access resources. This paper sought to quantify the consumers’ surplus (CS) of pleasure seekers who visit the beach. It specifically assessed the value visitors place on the beach and subsequently determined an appropriate access fee for the Elmina beach in Ghana as a means for welfare improvement among the local people. The individual Travel Cost Model was used. The trip generation function was estimated through a Negative Binomial Count Model. The annual average number of visits made to the beach per visitor was approximately 7, with a maximum trip cost of 8 Ghana cedis (US$4.08). Travel cost, age, educational level, multi-destination and multi-purpose trips were significant determinants of recreational trips made to the beach. The consumer’s surplus per visitor per trip for local and non-local visitors was 39.43 Ghana cedis (US$20.12) and 64.47 Ghana cedis (US$32.89) respectively. Tests of hypotheses revealed a significant difference between local and non-local visitors, with multi-destination and multi-purpose trips influencing the number of trips made to the beach significantly. The maximum access fee was 74.2 Ghana cedis (US$37.88) per visitor per annum. The results also indicated that extracting some CS of pleasure seekers at the beach through access fees could provide livelihood support for the several chronically poor people in Elmina, where the beach is located. Additionally, the environmental and coastal erosion threats faced by the residents could be checked to some extent through these fees to reduce climate change vulnerability among the people. Keywords: consumers’ surplus, economic welfare, Elmina beach, Ghana, travel cost

Funding Culture: An Analysis of Historic Site Preservation Policy

This paper examines the way in which public funding and tax policies are applied to federally recognized historic preservation sites and how that application influences the a variety of stakeholder communities including tax payers, historical organizations, historic property owners, and municipalities

How do event zones influence visitor behaviour and engagement with host destinations? : A longitudinal study of the Cambridge half marathon (2017–2020)

© 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)This work identifies important influencing factors that affect event visitor behaviour in and beyond event zones, utilising a four-year, mixed-method, longitudinal study (n=6212) of the Cambridge Half Marathon (2017–2020). We counter a commonly held view that visitors naturally spill out into local cultural and business precincts, arguing that event zones represent cities within cities that spatially segregate visitors from the host destination; only 7% of the sample engaged in longer and deeper cultural stays. Quantitative data reveals statistically significant demographic and tripographic factors that increase the likelihood of visitors venturing beyond the event zone, whilst qualitative data reveals the behavioural and organisational factors that encourage or discourage engagement. Managerial tactics and strategies for encouraging visitors to venture beyond event zones, across host destinations, to optimise local economic benefits across the host destination are presented.Peer reviewe

Tracking the Elusive Student: Opportunities for Connection and Assessment

At Eastern Michigan University, information about library resources and services for Extended Programs (off-campus and online) students was provided in a number of online locations, and was sometimes inconsistent and difficult to manage. The library formed an internal task force to evaluate all of the library information and instructional materials provided to Extended Programs students. The task force consolidated key information in one location on the library web site and collaborated with departments within the library and around campus to provide links from the relevant online locations. This case study describes how Google Analytics was used to assess the use of the revised library web site and online instructional materials by Extended Programs students. The researchers describe examples of techniques for using Google Analytics and explain how the data collected was used to identify further enhancements to the information provided to Extended Programs students

Conservation Conversations Webinar Summary - Conservation and Outdoor Recreation: Challenges and Solutions to Keeping our Parks and Public Lands From Being Loved To Death

Americans love their public lands. They have turned to them to connect with their families, to maintain an active lifestyle, and to escape 24-hour news cycles that seem to bring nothing but bad news. The recreational use that our public lands receive is not a new trend however. Over the past 10-years, visitation to all types National Park Service units (e.g., parks, monuments, historic sites, etc.) has increased by 16%, with national parks alone seeing a 28% increase in visitation. Visitation to many national parks reaches record levels every year. At the same time, the ecosystems of our parks and public lands are changing notably. National parks as a whole are warming at twice the rate as the rest of the country. As a result, we are losing some of the outstanding resources our parks and public lands were established to protect in the first place. Many national forests are struggling to maintain trails and campgrounds under the weight of more intense and diverse use. Visitation to national forests is up 5% over the past ten years as well. More use of our forests has been associated with the increased occurrence of human-caused wildfire. The challenges of visitation are being seen in our state park systems as well. Visitation to state parks is up nearly 11% across the country since 2009. Simultaneously, operating budgets have declined by over 21%. Recent research has estimated that we will need $42 billion dollars in additional appropriations and revenues to state park systems to meet projected demand. These are complex resource management challenges that will require focused and coordinated policy efforts to address. The two panel discussions that were part of this webinar bring together representatives of the National Park Service, the USDA Forest Service, the National Association of State Park Directors, and leading academic institutions to identify policy and management solutions to keeping America’s parks and public lands from being loved to death

Measuring the economic contribution of beer festivals on local economies: The case of York, United Kingdom

This paper investigates the economic contribution of beer festivals on local economies by analysing the Knavesmire Beer Festival at York, United Kingdom. Using information collected via means of a survey questionnaire and applying Type I multipliers, we estimate the total expenditure generated by visitors within and outside festivals' premises, measuring its impact on the local economy in terms of jobs created and GVA contributions. Findings reveal the impact of the festival on the York economy and the wider brewing industry, providing empirical evidence and original results about the economic contribution that beer festivals can generate at a local level

The Economic Impact of the 2016 National Cherry Festival

The National Cherry Festival, July 2-9, 2016, is estimated to have generated or supported economic benefits for Grand Traverse County and Suttons Bay in the following ways: $19.0 million increase in economic output$11.3 million increase in direct spending $5.3 million increase in total earnings$1.1 million in new spending by the Cherry Festival organization Creating 228 local jobs Prompting $66.43 in average daily spending for all visitors Bringing$53.00 in per-person, per-day direct spendin

An Application of Travel Cost Method to Yuelu Mountain Park in Changsha, China

The objective of this thesis is to assess the recreational value (access value) provided by Yuelu Mountain Park in China applying travel cost method (TCM) which is commonly used to estimate non-market benefits. Also, a fee that would maximize the entrance fee income is tentatively calculated. The potential trips to be lost next year are estimated based on local respondents visiting intentions among different age groups. The travel cost demand function is estimated by using basic count data travel cost model-Poisson regression, and survey data collected on-site. Average access values per trip were estimated to be € 0.75 for local and € 64.52 for non-local individuals producing aggregate annual access value of € 20.43 million. Based on the travel cost demand function, an entrance fee of € 5.43 would maximize the revenue collected from the visitors. This would mean more than doubling of the present entrance fee. The result could potentially be utilized when deciding on the entrance fees. It is also suggested that the park management could further study visitors' intentions and reasons either to visit or not to visit the park in the future. Estimated consumer surpluses as well as suggested entrance fee must however, be considered with caution because truncation of the on-site survey data is not accounted for in the Poisson model estimations of this study