title: Estimating the willingness to pay to protect coral reefs from potential damage caused by climate change--The evidence from Taiwan.
abstract: Coral reefs constitute the most biologically productive and diverse ecosystem, and provide various goods and services including those related to fisheries, marine tourism, coastal protection, and medicine. However, they are sensitive to climate change and rising temperatures. Taiwan is located in the central part of the world's distribution of coral reefs and has about one third of the coral species in the world. This study estimates the welfare losses associated with the potential damage to coral reefs in Taiwan caused by climate change. The contingent valuation method adopted includes a pre-survey, a face-to-face formal survey, and photo illustrations used to obtain reliable data. Average annual personal willingness to pay is found to be around US$35.75 resulting in a total annual willingness to pay of around US$0.43 billion. These high values demonstrate that coral reefs in Taiwan deserve to be well preserved, which would require a dedicated agency and ocean reserves.
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Economics, National Chung-Hsing University, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: William Wei-Chun
authors.initials: WW
authors.lastname: Tseng
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Economics, National Chung-Hsing University, Taichung, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Shu-Han
authors.initials: SH
authors.lastname: Hsu
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Economics, National Chung-Hsing University, Taichung, Taiwan. Electronic address: mayjune@nchu.edu.tw.
authors.forename: Chi-Chung
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Chen
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D037421:Anthozoa; D057231:Climate Change; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources / Q000191:economics*; D057894:Coral Reefs; D017753:Ecosystem; D006801:Humans; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013624:Taiwan
keywords: Climate change; Coral reefs; Non-market valuation