TY - JOUR
T1 - Valuing the Barmah-Millewa Forest and in stream river flows
T2 - A spatial heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent (SHAC) approach
AU - Tapsuwan, Sorada
AU - Polyakov, Maksym
AU - Bark, Rosalind
AU - Nolan, Martin
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was conducted with funding from the CSIRO Water for Healthy Country Flagship and the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions .
Publisher Copyright:
© 2014 Published by Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2015/2/1
Y1 - 2015/2/1
N2 - This paper uses spatial heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent (SHAC) hedonic property price analysis of house sales during 2000-2011 to estimate the marginal value of in stream flows and proximity to an iconic freshwater ecosystem, the Barmah-Millewa Forest (BMF) in Australia's Murray-Darling Basin. We establish: (1) that proximity to the BMF is a statistically significant and positive determinant of nearby house prices in Victoria and New South Wales, i.e. for an average property worth $199,000 that is 10. km away from the BMF, moving 1. km closer will increase sales price by $2000; and (2) a non-linear relationship between in stream flow and sales price which is suggestive of homebuyer preferences for flow that is neither low (i.e. drought flows) nor high (i.e. flood flows). The results provide estimates of the benefits of in stream flow that could be used to inform freshwater ecosystem restoration policy in the basin and are suggestive of regional benefits that accrue to homeowners living near key freshwater-dependent ecosystems in the basin.
AB - This paper uses spatial heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent (SHAC) hedonic property price analysis of house sales during 2000-2011 to estimate the marginal value of in stream flows and proximity to an iconic freshwater ecosystem, the Barmah-Millewa Forest (BMF) in Australia's Murray-Darling Basin. We establish: (1) that proximity to the BMF is a statistically significant and positive determinant of nearby house prices in Victoria and New South Wales, i.e. for an average property worth $199,000 that is 10. km away from the BMF, moving 1. km closer will increase sales price by $2000; and (2) a non-linear relationship between in stream flow and sales price which is suggestive of homebuyer preferences for flow that is neither low (i.e. drought flows) nor high (i.e. flood flows). The results provide estimates of the benefits of in stream flow that could be used to inform freshwater ecosystem restoration policy in the basin and are suggestive of regional benefits that accrue to homeowners living near key freshwater-dependent ecosystems in the basin.
KW - Aesthetic appreciation
KW - Conservation area accessibility index
KW - Hedonic pricing
KW - In stream flows
KW - Water sharing
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84920996971&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2014.12.008
DO - 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2014.12.008
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84920996971
VL - 110
SP - 98
EP - 105
JO - Ecological Economics
JF - Ecological Economics
SN - 0921-8009
ER -
