Abstract
Many wild bee species are threatened across Europe, and with them the pollination function they provide. While numerous studies have assessed the value of bees as pollinators of crops, little is known about the non-marked value of bees. Using a choice modelling experiment, we examine these non-market values in Germany by identifying citizens’ willingness to pay (WTP) for wild bee conservation initiatives in four states. Effects of distance, state and regional affiliation are scrutinised, as previous research found these to affect respondents’ choices. Random parameter logit and latent class models are used to capture preference heterogeneity. Overall, we find strong support of wild bee conservation and a clear preference for improvement relative to the status quo, particularly in natural areas and for rare or endangered species. The yearly WTP for conservation initiatives ranges from 227 to 447€ per household. Our results show distance and regional effects on WTP. Initiatives in respondents’ home states are preferred, and increasing distance to initiatives in other states result in a slightly reduced WTP. Additionally, we observe regional preferences within an eastern and a western home region. These preferences are not explainable by socio-demographic characteristics, home state or distance and probably linked to social and cultural affiliations. We conclude that for widespread support in society and effective conservation initiatives, policy proposals must address this spatial heterogeneity from distance and regional effects.
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Notes
The effect of the number of alternatives to use is yet an unresolved issue (Mariel et al. 2021), weighting aspects of incentive compatibility, cognitive burden, amount of information and incentives for heuristics. Weng et al. (2021) find problems of convergence validity comparing a status quo option with one, two or three alternatives. While we have no test of the effect here, we note that a SQ and two alternatives is today the most applied form.
Strategic bidders were defined as those respondents that stated “No matter what it takes, I like the idea of doing something for nature” and/or “Irrespective of the costs, I choose the best initiative for nature” in Q12 and always chose the highest possible bid in each of the 12 CS (see S1).
Protest bidders were defined as respondents that stated “I am against this type of survey”, “I already pay enough duties”, “I already pay enough duties, I think the farmers should pay for it” and/or “I already pay enough duties, but I would like to pay if it was through a private donation” in Q11 and chose the status quo in all 12 CS (see S1).
The dist_state variable thereby indicated not the distance to the initiatives themselves, as commonly done in distance decay studies, but the distance to the state where the initiative was located. Since the location of the initiative within the state was not specified, respondents close to state borders were not considered to experience spill over effects from their close proximity to the state.
In a latent class model, it was tested whether other socio-demographics (gender, income, education) affect the results and WTP estimates across states (see Supplementary Material S3.H). This showed no effect. Therefore the sample was defined at the level of all four states and results to be representative for the German population.
After correcting the design in the second data collection in April 2020, the attribute showed a linear increase in preference and thus scope sensitivity (see S3.E and F).
Several respondents made a statement that is attributed to Albert Einstein (though not documented) stating that if bees disappeared off the face of the Earth, man would only have four years left to live. While this is a widespread belief, research disproves this claim (Klein et al. 2018).
66% of participants in a study on nature awareness stated that they knew about wild bee species decline and ranked it as the most important group to protect in agricultural landscapes (Schell et al. 2017).
Examples of statements by respondents (NB: corrected for spelling mistakes and translated by the authors): “Politics should do it because they have enough money and still would not do it, rather pocket the money you pay.”; “The federal government should use the billions that it otherwise wastes.”; “The German state has money for that, but throws it out the window.”; “The state is in a position to cover any expenditure from the federal budget!”.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank the anonymous reviewers for their extensive and valuable comments on this manuscript. The authors would further like to thank Julian Sagebiel from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences for his support in the analysis of the survey data. They thank Alice Rogowski, Bennet Bergmann, Helena Leinweber, Jan Peters, Jean Paul Moreaux, Thomas Prossliner, as well as the focus groups participants for their valuable comments on the early version of the questionnaire. This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. C.M., B.D. and C.R. thank the Danish National Research Foundation for its support of the Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate (Grant No. DNRF96).
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Moreaux, C., Jacobsen, J.B., Meyerhoff, J. et al. Distance and Regional Effects on the Value of Wild Bee Conservation. Environ Resource Econ 84, 37–63 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-022-00692-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-022-00692-z