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Mitigating water pollution: tourists’ willingness to pay for eco-friendly toilets in the Sagarmatha National Park, Mt. Everest area, Nepal

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Abstract

Water pollution problems in remote high mountain tourist areas combine aspects of both public goods and externality problems. Coordinating collective action between tourists and residents is difficult when the parties lack clear information about one another. We conducted survey experiments in the Sagarmatha National Park, Mt Everest region in 2018 (pilot study of 119 tourists from 22 nations) and 2022 (157 tourists from 35 nations) to assess tourists’ willingness to pay for water conservation. The survey instrument randomized how the respondents were conditioned prior to being asked whether or not and how much they would pay for public toilet facilities, with treatments including social norms and private benefits. The results suggest that invoking social norms around environmental behavior increases tourists’ likelihood to pay. We found that almost 90% of the tourists in the SNP can be considered “sustainable types,” or those who prefer to contribute to water conservation when prompted with environmental cues. On average, the respondents were willing to pay $0.84 per use for eco-friendly toilets.

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Data availability

The data will be published in Harvard Dataverse upon the publication of the manuscript.

Notes

  1. Studies find water pollution problems in areas along the Bertam river in the Cameron Highlands of Malaysia (Aminu et al., 2015), in the Okavango Delta in Botswana (Musora, Mbaiwa, and Murray-Hudson 2017), at the Youtefa Bay Tourism Park in Indonesia (Sari, Tuwo, Rani, and Saru 2020), at the Vasileva Lake in Kosovo (Ramshaj, Fetoshi, Kurteshi, and Hoxha 2019), along the Potrero de los Funes River Argentina (Almeida, Quintar, González, and Mallea 2007), in Lijiang Ancient Town in China (Baoying and Yuanqing 2007), and in Zanzibar, Tanzania (Gössling 2001).

  2. Although the tourist industry includes international companies, we focus on how local residents and business owners manage interactions with tourists because of their long-term interest in the land. In the SNP, the Sherpa community provides lodging, guide, and porter services. While actors outside the area can be potentially motivated to contribute to its preservation, engaging the local community is the most promising avenue.

  3. Nyborg et al. (2018) point out that the concept of norms varies across disciplines. For example, in psychology, social norms denote what is approved or what is normal, whereas in economics, norms refer to behaviors that are self-enforced within social interactions that feature multiple equilibria and are influenced by experimentation and adaptation. We adopt the definition used in economics because of its emphasis on social interactions.

  4. Caroli, Panzeri, and Haack (2013) completed a survey in the SNP with a similar composition. Tourists from the UK, US, Germany, Japan, France, and Australia comprised over 50% of their sample. Our surveys yield 47% from these countries.

  5. For example, several regulations have been introduced to protect forests and wildlife in the SNP. However, according to Manfredi et al. (2010), wastewater management still needs to be improved.

  6. Lal et al. (2017) also suggest that tourists are willing to pay more for protected areas.

  7. Our review of the subsequent literature yields no newer models that incorporate high mountain conditions.

  8. We find this result from Bimonte’s model particularly fitting for the SNP, as we found that guides, teahouse owners, and members of the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee were particularly interested in learning our results. Their concern over tourist preferences highlights the importance of expectations in facilitating cooperation.

  9. Notably, in our discussions with residents of the SNP, we found that local community leaders were extremely interested in knowing more about tourist preferences over conservation.

  10. Transporting the system along narrow and steep pathways would be difficult, and the low temperatures at high altitudes make composting challenging.

  11. Some successful industry organizations are reported in previous research. The Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators and the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators are examples, but there have also been difficulties in maintaining these institutions (Bystrowska et al., 2017; Haase et al., 2009).

  12. Although the number of tourists declined significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, the volume of visitors has rebounded, as trekkers from advanced nations with access to vaccines have returned to their pre-pandemic activities.

  13. Power analysis indicates 120 cases would be needed to meet the conventional power level of 0.8 and the significance level of 0.05, if we want to detect a $0.25 difference between the groups (Ceran Serdar 2021). Since the difference we observe between the control group and the experimental group with the social norm treatment in 2021 was about $0.38, the sample size of 157 was sufficient to detect the difference. More than 2000 cases would have been necessary to detect the difference of $0.15 between the control group and the experimental group with economic norms. During the 2 weeks of the study in May 2022, roughly 2000 total were in the SNP. It was not feasible to encounter and survey all of them.

  14. The data will be published in Harvard Dataverse upon the publication of the manuscript.

  15. We received exempt status from our university’s Institutional Review Board (#181,147–1). We secured informed consent from all respondents.

  16. CV has been used to establish the value of new public services in developing nations, the benefits of conserving tropical rainforests, and larger scale environmental amenities such as clean oceans (Carson 1998).

  17. CV methodology has been criticized because it measures respondents’ stated preferences under hypothetical situations instead of their revealed preferences in market transactions. Because respondents do not actually have to pay the amounts they report in the surveys, critics also suggest that they inflate their valuations of environmental goods (Xu et al., 2009). However, the CV method is widely used because it is often the only technique available to identify the monetary values individuals place on the conservation of public and environmental goods (Carson 1998, 2000, 2012). Critics also note that CV cannot accurately measure the values of complex goods and environmental goods that are unrelated to respondents’ day-to-day lives (Carson et al., 2003). Our question did not focus on the value of clean water in the SNP as an abstract good. Instead, it addressed a very specific activity (using the toilet) that every respondent engages in every single day.

  18. The AIC evaluates the fit of models. Smaller values indicate better fit.

  19. The effects of economic norms were not statistically significant, but this may have been due to the small sample size.

  20. Questionnaires were pulled out of an envelope randomly. However, tourists who were in the same trekking group were given the same questionnaire, after the first sheet was pulled.

  21. A few respondents answered with very high values, such as $20 and $50. However, one such respondent indicated in extra space that they would pay $20 at the entrance point instead of paying for each use. Hence, it seems that respondents offering high values chose to provide lump sum amounts they would be willing to pay for the duration of their visit.

  22. Baral et al. (2008) estimated the median WTP for the Annapurna Conservation Area to be $74.30.

  23. Several tourists indicated after completing their surveys that while they would be willing to contribute, they would prefer to pay all of their costs at one time and place.

Abbreviations

AIC:

Akaike information criterion

ANOVA:

Analysis of variance

CPR:

Common pool resources

CV:

Contingent valuation

MBR:

Membrane bioreactors

NPR:

Nepalese rupee

SNP:

Sagarmatha National Park

SNPBZ:

Sagarmatha National Park and Buffer Zone

UNESCO:

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

US:

United States

UK:

United Kingdom

WTP:

Willingness to pay

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the ADVANCE Proposal Development at Ball State University (#000588).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science, Ball State University, Muncie, IN, 47306, USA

    Steven R. Hall & Misa Nishikawa

  2. Department of Environment, Geology, and Natural Resources, Ball State University, Muncie, IN, 47306, USA

    Kirsten Nicholson

  3. Munice, USA

    Steven R. Hall

Authors
  1. Steven R. Hall
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Misa Nishikawa.

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The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board at Ball State University.

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Appendices

Appendix 1

Nationalities of 2022 survey respondents

Australia

7

Argentina

5

Austria

1

Belgium

2

Brazil

1

Bulgaria

1

Canada

5

Chile

1

Denmark

1

France

5

Germany

6

Hungarian

1

Iceland

1

India

30

Israel

5

Italy

1

Japan

1

Kazachstan

2

Malaysia

4

Myanmar

1

Nepal

5

Netherland

3

NZ

1

Poland

2

Romania

2

Slovakia

1

Slovenia

1

South Africa

1

Sweden

1

Switzerland

2

UK

32

US

19

Vietnam

1

Missing

5

Total

157

Appendix 2

Effects of social norms and private benefits on how much tourists are willing to pay (2022 Survey, linear regression with robust standard errors)

 

Model 1

Model 2

Model 3

Q2 norms (environmental)

0.386***

0.394***

0.288**

(0.114)

(0.117)

(0.130)

Q3 norms (local economy)

0.169

0.177*

0.173

(0.103)

(0.104)

(0.124)

Q4 private benefits (clean)

0.387***

0.395***

0.257**

(0.136)

(0.139)

(0.128)

Female

 

0.013

 − 0.013

 

(0.092)

(0.100)

Age

 

0.004

 − 0.002

 

(0.003)

(0.004)

Education

  

0.003

  

(0.013)

Income 2

  

 − 0.301**

  

(0.121)

Income 3

  

0.097

  

(0.153)

Income 4

  

0.049

  

(0.182)

Income 5

  

 − 0.486

  

(0.303)

Income 6

  

0.086

  

(0.187)

India

  

0.115

  

(0.109)

UK

  

0.291**

  

(0.133)

US

  

 − 0.215

  

(0.144)

Constant

0.457***

0.303*

0.539*

(0.064)

(0.159)

(0.286)

Adj R2

0.090

0.098

0.238

N

149

149

129

  1. *: P < 0.01, **: P < 0.05, ***: P < 0.01.

Appendix 3

Effects of social norms and private benefits on willingness to pay (2018 Pilot study, logistic regression)

 

Model 1

Model 2

Model 3

Q2 and Q3 norms (environmental)

1.270***

1.201**

1.409***

(0.475)

(0.490)

(0.525)

Q4 private benefits (Clean)

1.235

1.125

1.688*

(0.836)

(0.844)

(0.912)

Female

 

− 0.519

− 0.189

 

(0.488)

(0.530)

Age

 

0.020

0.017

 

(0.023)

(0.023)

US

  

− 1.243*

  

(0.731)

UK

  

0.181

  

(0.777)

India

  

1.825

  

(1.452)

GNI

  

0.031

  

(0.023)

Constant

0.470

0.025

− 1.396

(0.329)

(0.829)

(1.393)

Log likelihood

− 59.801

− 57.412

− 54.580

AIC

125.6

124.8

127.2

Pseudo R2

0.06

0.07

0.10

N

119

115

111

  1. *: P < 0.01, **: P < 0.05 ***: P < 0.01.

Appendix 4

Effects of social norms and private benefits on how much tourists are willing to pay (2018 Pilot study, linear regression with robust standard errors).

 

Model 1

Model 2

Model 3

Q2 and Q3 norms (environmental)

0.554***

0.413**

0.411**

(0.190)

(0.175)

(0.191)

Q4 private benefits (clean)

0.924**

0.905**

1.133**

(0.430)

(0.435)

(0.489)

Female

 

− 0.043

− 0.065

 

(0.216)

(0.254)

Age

 

− 0.000

− 0.000

 

(0.006)

(0.007)

US

  

− 0.411

  

(0.339)

UK

  

− 0.547**

  

(0.244)

India

  

0.386

  

(0.651)

GNI

  

0.013

  

(0.013)

Constant

0.595***

0.635***

0.182

(0.094)

(0.241)

(0.648)

Adj R2

0.074

0.074

0.119

N

115

111

107

  1. *: P < 0.01, **: P < 0.05, ***: P < 0.01.

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Hall, S.R., Nicholson, K. & Nishikawa, M. Mitigating water pollution: tourists’ willingness to pay for eco-friendly toilets in the Sagarmatha National Park, Mt. Everest area, Nepal. Environ Dev Sustain (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-024-05022-5

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