Tourists’ Willingness to Pay Increased Entrance Fees at Mexican Protected Areas: A Multi-Site Contingent Valuation Study

Autor: Witt, Brian
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2019
Předmět:
Zdroj: Sustainability, Vol 11, Iss 11, p 3041 (2019)
Sustainability
Volume 11
Issue 11
ISSN: 2071-1050
Popis: It can be challenging to set protected area entrance fees without information on how much visitors are willing to pay. It is particularly difficult for agencies managing multiple sites to set fees without conducting surveys at each location. In order to examine how willingness to pay estimates would vary across sites with distinctive profiles, 877 visitors at five Mexican protected sites (Calakmul, Cobá
Palenque, Sian Ka&rsquo
an, and Yum Balam) were interviewed through double-bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation surveys. The results suggest that visitors would be willing to pay higher entrance fees, with mean maximum willingness to pay estimates of 2.8&ndash
9.8 times current fees, ranging from US$15.70 to US$25.83. Visitor demand was found to be relatively inelastic, with aggregate fee rises of 26% estimated to result in a 5% decrease in visitation. These results suggest that there is room to raise revenues through moderate fee increases without a concomitant drop-off in visitation.
Databáze: OpenAIRE