(Luận văn) willingness to pay for the conservation of yew trees in vietnam

t to ng UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY VIETNAM hi INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES THE HAGUE THE NETHERLANDS ep w n lo VIETNAM - NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS ad ju y th yi pl ua al n WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR THE CONSERVATION OF YEW TREES IN VIETNAM n va ll fu oi m at nh BY NGUYEN THANH TUAN z z jm ht vb k MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS om l.c gm an Lu n va ey t re HO CHI MINH CITY, SEPTEMBER 2013 th t to UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY VIETNAM ng INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES THE HAGUE THE NETHERLANDS hi ep w n VIETNAM - NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS lo ad ju y th yi pl al n ua WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR THE CONSERVATION OF YEW TREES IN VIETNAM n va fu ll A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of m oi MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS at nh z z k jm NGUYEN THANH TUAN ht vb By om l.c gm DR TRUONG DANG THUY an Lu Academic Supervisor: n va ey t re th HO CHI MINH CITY, SEPTEMBER 2013 t to Abstract ng hi Yew tree has not only value in use of wood products but also in existence of itself which ep provides valuable opportunities to other fields of research such as biology, chemistry, w pharmacology The number of Vietnamese yew trees, however, has reduced year after year n lo and today there are only approximately 250 natural individuals locating in Daklak, Vietnam ad ju y th According to the IUCN and Viet Nam Red Data Book, Vietnamese yew trees are critically endangered The subject of this research is to measure the existence value of yew trees using yi pl contingent valuation method (CVM) with single-bound dichotomous choice (DC) The study al n ua finds out that the mean WTP for conservation of Yew in Vietnam is approximately VND n va 73,000 per household; and household heads with different socio-economic characteristics ll fu such as age, income, occupation, and education have significantly different levels of WTP oi m at nh z z k jm ht vb om l.c gm an Lu n va ey t re th t to ng hi ep Acknowledgement w I would like to thank my supervisor for his instruction and comments through my research Especially I am deeply impressed by his enthusiasm with all students working with him That is one of the motivations to help me accomplishing the thesis n lo ad ju y th I also want to say thanks to all of professors, lecturers, and other people in this program Without knowledge from their classes and tutorials, my thesis cannot be possible yi Eventually, I would like to express my gratitude to my family, my friends, and my company who did support me during the time of studying and working on my thesis pl al n ua Nguyen Thanh Tuan n va ll fu oi m at nh z z k jm ht vb om l.c gm an Lu n va ey t re th t to Table of Contents ng Chapter 1: Introduction hi Chapter 2: Literature Review ep 2.1 A brief history of CVM 2.2 Economic theory of CVM 10 w n 2.3 Basic elements of CVM 12 lo 2.4 Empirical applications 16 ad 2.5 Empirical studies In Vietnam 17 y th Chapter 3: Methodology and Data 19 ju yi 3.1 WTP estimation 19 pl 3.2 Survey design 21 al ua Chapter 4: Results and Discussions 26 n Chapter 5: Conclusion 53 n va ll fu oi m at nh z z k jm ht vb om l.c gm an Lu n va ey t re th t to List of tables ng hi ep Table 1: Survey mode 13 Table 2: Statements 33 Table 3: Response of WTP questions – at the first time 36 Table 4: Response of WTP questions – at the second time 36 Table 5: Calculated mean WTP – non-parametric estimate 43 Table 6: Definitions of variables included in the regression 44 Table 7: Results of simple regression with constant and BID 45 Table 8: Regression results 47 Table 9: Summary of parametric estimated WTPs for the case of dependent variable - Y22 51 Table 10: summary of estimated WTPs for the case of dependent variable – Y22 52 w n lo ad ju y th yi pl n ua al List of figures n va Figure 1: Distribution of respondents’ age 26 Figure 2: Cross - tabulation of marital status and group of age 27 Figure 3: Occupation by gender 28 Figure 4: Levels of education 29 Figure 5: Gender in levels of education 30 Figure 6: Distribution of reported household income 30 Figure 7: Country facing problems 31 Figure 8: Environmental issues 32 Figure 9: Ranks of proposal species 33 Figure 10: Attitude toward endangered species 34 Figure 11: Survivor function for the second time WTP question 37 Figure 12: Reasons of why respondents dislike the proposed payment vehicle – electricity surcharge 40 Figure 13: Discussion time to answer questionnaire 41 Figure 14: Survivor function after certainty adjustment for the first time WTP elicitation 42 Figure 15: Survivor function after certainty adjustment for the second time WTP elicitation 43 ll fu oi m at nh z z k jm ht vb om l.c gm an Lu n va ey t re th Willingness to Pay for the Conservation of Yew-trees in Vietnam t to ng Chapter 1: Introduction hi ep Yew (also known as water-conifer) is - the scientific names Glyptostrobus pensilis - listed in the IUCN and Vietnam red data Books as endangered situation (CR)1, and w considered as the living fossil of gymnosperm industry The Decree 32/2006/ND- n lo CP of the Vietnamese government has stated that this kind of tree is classified into ad group IA: strictly banned from exploitation and use for commercial purposes y th ju According to the reports of Forest Protection Department (FPD) of DakLak yi pl province, this species of yew trees in the world now exists only in Ea Ral (Ea H'Leo ua al district), Trap K'sor (Krong Nang district) and a few dozen has been scattered in n Krong Buk district, DakLak province (Bao Huy, 2010) This ancient species facing n va extinction needs urgent solutions for propagation, conservation and development fu ll Yew wood is un-attackable to termite, warping, and fragrant Therefore, it is m oi normally used to produce furniture, household goods, musical instruments, etc The at nh breathing roots which are smooth, porous, and light have been used to produce cork, hat Moreover, its branches, leaves, and ripe cones are used as arthritic medications, z z pain reducing, and skinny tightening It also has fine grain, many patterns, and vb jm ht especially the longer soak in the water or mud, the shinier it is Additionally, yew shape is beautiful, then, one could grow yews for ornamentation, or for protection k Population and habitats of yew tree in Daklak, Vietnam: om l.c gm the coastal land from erosion The number of yew currently is 255 individuals2 which only locate in Daklak an Lu province (Bao Huy, 2010) There are 219 individuals of yew in Ea Ral, Ea H’leo n va th Page ey CR – according to classification of IUCN and Vietnam red data book, CR means critically endangered The order of classification is that Extinct (EX), Extinct in the wild (EW), Critically endangered (CR), Endangered (EN), Vulnerable (VU), Lower risk (LR), Data deficient (DD), and Not evaluated (NE) Find more details in Vietnam Red Data Book, Part II Plants (Dang et al., 2007) According to the managers of the conserving yew tree project in Daklak for period 2011 – 2015, this number was updated as 162 individuals in Aug, 2012 t re Willingness to Pay for the Conservation of Yew-trees in Vietnam t to district; 31 individuals in Trap K’sor, Krong Nang district; and old trees in Cu Ne, ng hi Krong Buk district ep The existence of yew has not only meaning to itself, but also to the whole area of w primary forest with biodiversity in which they locate According to Bao Huy (2010), n lo with the biological characteristic that they have just lived in the seasonal wetlands, ad yews only exist in some specific areas in Vietnam or in the world With the y th thousand-year existence, yews and biological system in the area of conservation ju yi have been a very valuable place for researches If there is no action or intervention pl from the government from now, the risk of permanent loss of the thousand-year al ua primitive forest is inevitable by the growing and strengthening effects of timber n extraction and yew-wood trading activities That would be a large detriment for va n studies have not been done as well as the discovery of biodiversity here ll fu m Figure 1C (in Appendix C) illustrates the current distribution of yew individuals in oi Trap Ksor (Krong Nang) Each individual has been numbered as shown in the nh at figure The distribution is dispersed widely in a large area In Trap Ksor (Krong z Nang, Daklak), on March 24, 1987 the local government of Daklak province z ht vb established a Decision about scheming and forbidding Trap Ksor forest area, and jm identified that this zone had become a protection area of yew trees’ gene The total k area is about 98.6 hectares and under the control of rangers and contractual gm officers The surrounding area is agricultural land, separated from the core zone by l.c simple barbed wire The current problems with this preservation area are that there om are not sufficient human resources for protection purpose, low budget (about 16 an Lu million VND per year), and long distance from here to the managerial office (10 kilometers) This explains why there are still a lot of timber extraction activities n va here Moreover, the agricultural activities of farmers in surrounding area have ey t re reduced the water resource that supports for growing and fire protecting of yew (Bao Huy, 2010) th Page Willingness to Pay for the Conservation of Yew-trees in Vietnam t to Figure 2C (in Appendix C) describes the current distribution of yew population in ng hi Ea Ral (Ea H’leo) In comparison with population in Trap Ksor, the individuals’ ep location is quite close This would be a good condition in planning this area for conservation program In Ea Ral (Ea Hleo), the Yew management station has been w n established and under control of Ea Hleo forest protection unit (FPU) in 1994 But lo ad according to the manager, there has been not an official decision for this y th establishment The number of rangers here is just five persons Similarly to Trap ju Ksor, this lack of management gives more opportunities to illegal loggers The yi pl statistic number of FPU shows that during 2009 there have been 22 violating cases ua al caught and prosecuted (Bao Huy, 2010) n The number of yew trees in Cu Ne (Krong Buk) is just five individuals In addition, va n these trees are very old and without top of trees All of them locate far away from fu ll the residential area, then, the officers face many considerably difficulties in m oi protecting activities (Bao Huy, 2010) According to scientists (Bao Huy, 2010; at nh Tran, 2012 in Thai, 2012), the number of current yew trees is going to be reduced in the near future due to the increasing illegal logging and trading z z ht vb Current efforts of conserving yew tree in Daklak province: In 2011, the jm government of Daklak province has approved the project of conserving habitat and k yew trees in DakLak for period 2011 - 2015 The project was designed with funding gm from the state budget and partly from the contributions of the people and the l.c international donor organizations However, this project had not been implemented om until August 2012, and at that time, only Ea Ral area was taken over by the project an Lu managers The remaining areas in Krong Buk and Krong Nang have just been handed over in March 2013 This slow procedure is due to lack of personnel and n va funding3 According to the project design, the Ea Ral area needs at least people on ey t re patrolling duty However, three of them are general staff, and handle concurrently Mr Phuoc – current director of Yew conservation program – answered reporter of Da Nang Polices Newspaper on May 20, 2013 Online version is available at http://cadn.com.vn/new/65_10471_-tha-p-tung-ba-u-va-t-thu-y-tu-ng.aspx Page th Willingness to Pay for the Conservation of Yew-trees in Vietnam t to jobs as official and patrolling staff in reality Infrastructure and equipment are not ng hi fully equipped This has made limited in ability to protect yew populations in Ea ep Ral, especially patrolling activities in protected areas With flooded and marshy properties, the movement of patrol is very difficult In heavy rain conditions, this w n problem is even more difficult Another concerning problem is the area around the lo ad belt has not been cleared; there are many individuals of yew being on the boundary y th and adjacent areas of agricultural crops of the local residents Therefore, it is very ju easy for illegal loggers to intrude the reserves At the same time, farming operations, yi pl irrigation of the surrounding population directly affect water resources and ua al ecological conditions of the yew populations n As mentioned above the number of yew individuals in Ea Ral area was counted as va n 219 at the time of conducting the project research by a group of researchers from the fu ll Tay Nguyen University in 2010 However, until the project management was m oi officially formed and accepted the transfer of management, this number is only 140 at nh yew trees The main reason is due to destruction of illegal loggers If the loss of control is continued, there will be more individuals of yew ruined annually The z z reduced number of yew also means that the resource for research and breeding will vb jm ht decrease Reducing the number of individuals and increasing of competing species which have been dominated habitats, plus the impacts of unfavorable natural k gm elements from the surrounding agricultural activities will directly affect the habitat l.c of yew environment This increases the risk of loss of yew in the future om Research problems an Lu In summary, the lack of resources for research and management has constrained the Page th yews in these areas are old, and have a very poor growth and sparse foliage ey young yew tree by seed, just only a few plants regenerated by buds Most individual t re the scientists who were tracking these areas did not recognize any regeneration of n this task limited One important thing should be considered is that during 35 years va conservation of yew trees Moreover, the low ability and quantity of rangers make