In many empirical contingent valuation studies one finds that household size, i.e. the number of household members, is negatively correlated with stated household willingness to pay for the realization of environmental projects. This observation is rather puzzling because in larger households...

Although contingent valuation is the dominant technique for the valuation of public projects, especially in the environmental sector, the high costs of contingent valuation surveys prevent the use of this method for the assessment of relatively small projects. The reason for this cost problem is...

With the availability of new techniques to close wine bottles avoiding the risk of “corky” taste the tradition of closing wine bottles with cork stoppers is on the retreat. As a consequence the Mediterranean cork oak forests with their rich biodiversity are endangered since their cultivation...

The Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) aims at the assessment of people's willingness to pay (WTP) for a public project. The sum of the individual WTPs is interpreted as the social benefits of the project under consideration and compared to the project costs. If the benefits exceed the costs the...

The cultivation of rubber trees in Xishuangbanna Prefecture in China's Yunnan Province has triggered an unprecedented economic development but it is also associated with severe environmental problems. Rubber plantations are encroaching the indigenous rainforests at a large scale and a high speed...