Science-based, multinational management of the Baltic Sea offers lessons on amelioration of highly disturbed marine ecosystems.

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This paper considers the role which selfish, moral and social incentives and pressures play in explaining the extent to which stated choices over pro-environment behaviours vary across individuals. The empirical context is choices over household waste contracts and recycling actions in Poland. A theoretical model is used to show how cost-based motives and the desire for a positive self and social image combine to determine the utility from alternative choices of recycling behaviour. We then describe a discrete choice experiment designed to empirically investigate the effects such drivers have on stated choices. A hybrid logit model is used to link statements over attitudes to recycling to choices, dealing with a potential endogeneity problem caused by the joint effects of un-observables on attitudes and choices. We find that a substantial share of our respondents prefer to sort their waste at home rather than in a central sorting facility. This preference is associated with a moral/intrinsic motivation, involving a belief that sorting at home is more thorough than central sorting.

10The world's largest concentration of cold-water coral (CWC) is found off the Norwegian coast. Most 11 CWC discoveries are recent, posing new challenges for Norwegian coastal and fisheries authorities 12 regarding the management of deep-sea resources. Scientific knowledge of CWC is limited, and many 13 citizens have not even heard about them. This creates problems for the application of stated 14 preference methods to capture their economic value, and very few such studies have been 15conducted. To fill this gap, we designed a discrete choice experiment, which was implemented in a 16 valuation workshop setting in order to derive estimates of participants' willingness to pay (WTP) for 17 increasing the protection of CWC. Despite the fact that marine industries such as oil/gas and fisheries 18 could be adversely affected by CWC protection, this did not reduce the respondents' willingness to 19 pay for further protection. The possibility that CWC play an important role as habitat for fish was the 20 single most important variable to explain respondents WTP for CWC protection. conducted. To fill this gap, we designed a discrete choice experiment, which was implemented in a 51 valuation workshop setting in order to derive estimates of participants' willingness to pay (WTP) for 52 increasing the protection of CWC. Despite the fact that marine industries such as oil/gas and fisheries 53 could be adversely affected by CWC protection, this did not reduce the respondents' willingness to 54 pay for further protection. The possibility that CWC play an important role as habitat for fish was the 55 single most important variable to explain respondents WTP for CWC protection. The survey revealed 56 a high degree of preference heterogeneity, whilst we found an average WTP for CWC protection in 57 the range of EUR 274-287. Marine organisms have long fascinated humans, as well as being of crucial importance for our well-66 being. Marine ecosystems provide supporting, provisioning, regulating and cultural ecosystem 67 services as defined in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA, 2005). Over recent decades, 68 increasing awareness of the benefits our oceans provide has raised an interest in assessing the 69 economic value of these goods and services, although due to their "hidden" nature, many of these 70 benefits go un-noticed until they diminish (Stewart and Smout, 2013). Notwithstanding this, a 71 number of studies have recently emerged which quantify the economic benefits of protecting marine 72 species (Jobstvogt et al., 2014;Rogers, 2013;Hynes et al., 2013; Ressurreicao et al., 2011). 73 74Tropical corals have been subject to a series of economic valuation studies (see e.g. Spurgeon, 1992, 75 Pendleton, 1995, Parsons and Thur, 2007, Sarkis et al., 2012, and have been identified as the global 76 biome with the highest valued ecosystem services in aggregate (de Groot et al., 2012). Their deep-77 sea cousins, cold-water corals (CWC) have by contrast so far been subject to only one valuation 78 effort, which was l...

There are two major ways in which solid waste can be sorted and recycled -at the household level, when households are required to sort waste into a given number of categories, or in specialized sorting facilities. Traditionally, it has been thought that sorting at the household level is an inconvenience, as it uses space and requires time and consideration. Our study provides empirical evidence to the contrary. Through a carefully designed choice experiment we collected stated choices of the members of a Polish municipalities with respect to the way their waste is sorted and how often it is collected. In the scenario of our study, respondents were informed that the waste will be sorted anyway -if not at the household level than at a specialized sorting facility. Interestingly, analysis of the preferences of members of the general public shows, that people are willing to sort waste at the household level, even if unsorted waste would be collected at no extra cost. We calculate maximum willingness to pay for collecting sorted vs. unsorted waste, as well for increased frequency of collection. Overall, our results provide encouraging evidence that most people prefer to sort waste themselves if given the choice, and thus demonstrate their pro-environment preferences, even without economic incentives to do so. JEL codes Q51, Q53, D12

The paper investigates the spatial heterogeneity of public's preferences for the implementation of a new country-wide forest management and protection program in Poland. Spatial econometric methods and high resolution geographical information system data related to forest characteristics are used to explain the variation in individual-specific willingness to pay (WTP) values, derived from a discrete choice experiment study. We find that respondents' WTP is higher the closer they live to their nearest forest, and the scarcer forests are in the area where they live. Interestingly, the higher the ecological value of forests in respondents' area, the more people prefer extending areas of national forest protection. We also investigate spatial patterns in individual-specific WTP scores and in latent class membership probabilities, finding that preferences are indeed spatially clustered. We argue that this clustering should be taken into account in forest management and policy-making. Keywords

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