Economic Analysis of Environmental Benefits of Integrated Pest Management

Abstract

Public support for integrated pest management (IPM) is derived in part from concerns over food safety and the environment, yet few studies have assessed the economic value of health and environmental benefits of IPM. An approach is suggested for such an assessment and applied to the Virginia peanut IPM program. Effects of IPM on environmental risks posed by pesticides are assessed and society's willingness to pay to reduce those risks is estimated. The annual environmental benefits of the peanut IPM program are estimated at $844,000. The estimates of pesticide risks and willingness to pay can be applied elsewhere in economic assessments of IPM.

A meta-analysis of the willingness to pay for reductions in pesticide risk exposure

“…Considerably fewer studies address the ecological dimension of pesticide risk (see, e.g. Higley and Wintersteen, 1992;Mullen et al, 1997;Lohr and Higley, 1999;Foster and Mourato, 2000;Brethour and Weersink, 2001;Cuyno et al, 2001). …”

“…Higley and Wintersteen (1992), Mullen et al (1997), and Brethour and Weersink (2001) extend the focus of the pesticide risk literature by including the valuation of changes in integrated pesticide risk management on the environment in addition to considering acute and chronic human toxicity for farmers. 3 Their environmental categories include ground and surface water, aquatic species, avian species, mammals, and arthropods.…”

Managing environmental risk in agriculture: a systematic perspective on the potential of quantitative policy-oriented risk valuation

“…Significantly fewer studies address the ecological dimension of agrochemical risk (see, e.g. Higley and Wintersteen, 1992;Mullen et al, 1997;Lohr et al, 1999;Foster and Mourato, 2000;Brethour and Weersink, 2001;Cuyno et al, 2001;Travisi and Nijkamp, 2004). But what can we learn from the abundance of results in the literature?…”

Willingness to Pay for Agricultural Environmental Safety: Evidence from a Survey of Milan, Italy, Residents

“…Examples of previous studies using CV methods for pesticide risk valuation can be found in Higley and Wintersteen (1992); Bubzy et al (1995); Mullen et al (1997); Fu et al, (1999); Brethour and Weersink (2001); Cuyno et al (2001); Wilson (2002). Recently, Foster and Mourato (2000) and Schou et al (2002) have applied Contingent Ranking techniques to value multiple pesticide impacts, while several examples of Conjoint Analysis -applied to the valuation of various pesticide risks for consumers-can be found in Baker and Crosbie (1993), Eom (1994) and Baker (1999).…”