Public preferences for ecological indicators used in Everglades restoration

The Everglades is one of the largest wetland ecosystems in the world covering almost 18,000 square miles from central Florida southward to Florida Bay. Over the 20th century, efforts to drain the Everglades for agriculture and development severely damaged the ecosystem so that today roughly 50% of t...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2020-06, Vol.15 (6), p.e0234051-e0234051
Main Authors: Stainback, G Andrew, Lai, John H, Pienaar, Elizabeth F, Adam, Damian C, Wiederholt, Ruscena, Vorseth, Chloe'
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural development
Agriculture
Aquatic animals
Aquatic birds
Aquatic ecosystems
Aquatic reptiles
Attitude
Biodiversity
Biological indicators
Biology and Life Sciences
Birds
Conservation of Natural Resources
Decision making
Discharge
Earth Sciences
Ecological restoration
Ecology and Environmental Sciences
Ecosystems
Endangered & extinct species
Environmental aspects
Environmental restoration
Florida
Heterogeneity
Households
Humans
Hydrology
Indicators
Lakes
People and places
Polls & surveys
Pollution control
Protection and preservation
Research and Analysis Methods
Restoration
Studies
Surveys
Surveys and Questionnaires
Sustainable development
Water quality
Water shortages
Wetlands
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The Everglades is one of the largest wetland ecosystems in the world covering almost 18,000 square miles from central Florida southward to Florida Bay. Over the 20th century, efforts to drain the Everglades for agriculture and development severely damaged the ecosystem so that today roughly 50% of the historic flow of water through the Everglades has been diverted elsewhere. In an attempt to restore the Everglades, the U.S. Congress authorized the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) in 2000, expected to cost over $16 billion and to take several decades to complete. We used the results from a stated preference choice experiment (SPCE) survey of Florida households to estimate the willingness to pay for several ecological attributes related to CERP performance indicators likely to be impacted by Everglades restoration. We also used a latent class model (LCM) to explore preference heterogeneity among respondents. On average, survey respondents were willing to pay for improvements in all of the attributes included in the survey, namely increased populations of wading birds, American alligators, endangered snail kites, and spotted seatrout, and reduced polluted discharges from Lake Okeechobee to the Caloosahatchee and St. Lucie rivers. Willingness to pay was highest for reduced polluted discharges from Lake Okeechobee.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0234051