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There is growing interest in demand-side interventions aimed at reducing residential peak-hour electricity consumption in response to energy transition. However, limited knowledge exists regarding residents' willingness to accept compensation (WTC) for power rationing during peak hours. This study empirically evaluates the compensation standards based on residents' willingness to accept power rationing in peak hours based on the Choice Experiment (CE). The results indicate that residents are concerned most with the attributes of power rationing seasons and power rationing periods, requiring higher compensation for power rationing in summer and at night, whether on weekdays or non-weekdays. Further analysis reveals significant regional and group heterogeneity. Specifically, residents in northern regions are not significantly concerned about the power rationing durations compared to those in southern regions, while they are more on power rationing degrees. Analysis based on the Latent Class Analysis (LCA) model shows that two classes of residents are willing to participate in the power rationing agreement for free on both weekdays and non-weekdays, as well as two categories of residents unwilling to participate in the compensated power rationing on non-weekdays. Based on this, we estimate that the adjusted participation rate of residents in compensated power rationing is 96.59% on weekdays, with compensation ranges from 0.67 ￥/kWh to 13.38 ￥/kWh, and a participation rate of 69.69% on non-weekdays, with compensation levels ranging from 3.99 ￥/kWh to 15.34 ￥/kWh. This paper also assesses the costs of power rationing compensation to provide evidence for policymakers when determining the compensation level of the power rationing program. • Power rationing season and periods are the most concerned by residents compared with other attributes. • Heterogeneity in regional and group preferences for compensated power rationing is estimated. • Residents' participation rate in power rationing is 96.59% on weekdays and 69.69% on non-weekdays. • The compensation level is 0.67–13.38 ￥/kWh on weekdays and 3.99–15.34 ￥/kWh on non-weekdays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Linking tropical cyclone activity with anthropogenic climate change is subject to on-going debate. However, modelling studies consistently have projected that climate change is likely to increase the intensity of cyclones and the related rainfall rates in the future. A precautionary approach to this possibility is to adapt to the adverse effects of the changing climate by improving early warning services for cyclones as a ‘no or low-regrets’ option. Given limited funding resources, assessments of economic efficiency will be necessary, and values for benefits are an essential input. This paper aims to estimate the benefits to households of an improved cyclone warning service in Vietnam. Choice experiment surveys with 1014 respondents were designed and conducted to inform this paper. The benefit estimates of the maximal improvements in a number of attributes of cyclone warning services (i.e. forecasting accuracy, frequency of update, and mobile phone based warnings) are approximately USD7.1–8.1 per household, which would be an upper bound estimate. Results from the marginal willingness to pay for the attributes suggest that investments should be dedicated to improvements in the accuracy of warning information and a warning service based on mobile phone short message. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract The JYNNR – a Ramsar Site, Biosphere Reserve and important wintering ground for 15–18% of the world's Red Crowned Cranes – faces major pressure from regional development. This paper uses choice experiments to assess farmer preferences for an “eco-compensation” program targeting pesticide use by rural communities in and near the Jiangsu-Yancheng Coastal Wetlands Rare Birds National Nature Reserve (JYNNR). “Eco-compensation” is a China-specific term encompassing many incentive-based environmental management approaches. To identify options to reconcile rural welfare improvement with conservation, data was collected from 311 rural households in and near the JYNNR assessing perceptions of the JYNNR, wetland birds, use and impact of pesticides, and preferences for contracts to mitigate pesticide impacts. Results suggest that conflict with the JYNNR is growing, and that pesticide management could be an effective entry-point for engagement. The analysis finds several options for cost-effective contracts: granting rights to leave the program without penalty and increasing share of household land enrolled significantly reduce willingness-to-accept-payment (WTA), while longer contracts and larger reductions in pesticide use increase WTA, which interact meaningfully with farmer characteristics. Providing communities with training and technical support on proper pesticide use could, under specific contract structures, be sufficient to induce 100% enrollment without subsidies. Graphical Abstract Unlabelled Image Highlights • Choice experiments are found to be effective for engaging rural communities. • Farmer preferences for reduced pesticide use near coastal wetlands are assessed. • Policy simulations identify several low-cost agri-environmental contract options. • Households prefer shorter contracts, more land enrolled and the ability to opt out. • Preferences for pesticide use reductions vary across household types in the sample. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the economic literature on the motivations underlying voluntary contributions to environmental public goods, little attention is granted to the way the overall objective of the environmental program is framed. A program which contributes to an increase of environmental quality can be perceived differently from a program designed to bring back the environmental quality to its original level, after it was damaged by human intervention. How does it impact participation rates and contribution levels? This paper addresses this issue in the context of agri-environmental schemes for biodiversity conservation. It compares farmers' willingness to participate in two contracts, one being framed as part of a biodiversity offset program, the other one as part of a biodiversity conservation program. We demonstrate with a discrete choice experiment that biodiversity-offsets programs need to offer a higher payment to enroll farmers compared to biodiversity conservation programs. This result is essentially driven by farmers who declare to have organic practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the potential use of insurance as a climate change adaptation mechanism in agriculture. We analyse the attractiveness of a climate risk insurance scheme and the choices farmers face between adaptation via farm management practices and purchase of crop insurance in the market. A choice experiment is used to reveal Danish farmers' preferences regarding an insurance contract where adoption of land management practices to improve soil sustainability is conditional for obtaining insurance cover in the market. Results indicate that in general arable farmers and farmers with low soil quality who have experienced crop damages in the past are more likely to purchase such conditional insurance. Farmers with good quality soils, who perceive that they have already adapted their practices to climatic risks and who have not experienced losses due to adverse climatic events in the past are less willing to purchase insurance. The paper contributes to the limited knowledge on preferences for climate risk related insurance in agricultural systems in general, and in Europe in particular. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The planned re-introduction of nuclear energy in Italy was abandoned in the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear accident. Twenty years earlier, soon after the Chernobyl accident, Italians had also voted against nuclear energy. However, a new nuclear energy technology, i.e. fourth generation, is under research and development. This paper investigates its social acceptance by means of a robust methodology, employing 1) choice experiments, 2) structural equation modeling and 3) information treatments within an online nation-wide survey. Results show a great deal of preference heterogeneity: the majority of the sampled respondents oppose new nuclear plants in Italy, with some not willing to accept any monetary compensation at all. However, another segment of respondents, more confident that fourth generation nuclear energy goals will be achieved, show a modest support towards the implementation of new nuclear projects. Additional variables were found to affect opposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We determine the effects of various management restrictions on adoption rates of marine Payments for Environmental Services (PES) schemes. Choice experiments are used in order to determine how fisher participation rates change under different marine PES programme designs. Various designs, with differing restriction rates, show different rates of adoption. However, fishers show a high utility loss associated with any move away from the current management situation, irrespective of restriction levels. This indicates that PES scheme costs may be high and creating an enabling environment could be important to reducing perceived losses, as could investment into conditional in-kind compensation mechanisms. The paper also shows choice experiments to be a useful tool in marine PES design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper investigates the sensitivity of choice experiment values 3AL for ecosystem services to ‘attribute non-attendance’. We consider three cases of attendance, namely that people may always, sometimes, or never pay attention to a given attribute in making their choices. This allows a series of models to be estimated which addresses the following questions: To what extent do respondents ignore attributes in choice experiments? What is the impact of alternative strategies for dealing with attribute non-attendance? Can respondents reliably self-report non-attendance? Do respondents partially attend to attributes, and what are the implications of this? Our results show that allowing for the instance of ‘sometimes attending’ to attributes in making choices offers advantages over methods employed thus far in the literature. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper is aimed at studying the dynamics of consumers'' preferences for corporate social responsibility. The data come from both a Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE) and a field experiment conducted in a real market setting. The results show that in a static setting (first month) predictions of a standard DCE study and real market shares are statistically similar for the various profiles of corporate social responsibility. However, as time evolves real market shares present some dynamic patterns that are not mirrored by the standard DCE predictions. The overall conclusion is that differences between real market behavior and DCE data can be attributed to the lack of learning experience — or adaptation — in DCE surveys rather than to the hypothetical nature of the experiments. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper addresses the issue of ordering effects in choice experiments, and in particular how learning processes potentially affect respondents' stated preferences in a sequence of choice sets. In a case study concerning food quality attributes of chicken breast filets, we find evidence of ordering effects in a sequence of 16 choice sets, where the last eight choice sets are identical to the first eight. We find evidence of changes in preferences. More precisely there are differences in preferences for the price attribute for the two identical sequences. Moreover, we find a reduction in the error variance for the last eight choice sets relative to the first eight choice sets. This is mainly caused by very high error variances in the first two choice sets. These results imply that learning effects in terms of institutional learning as well as – though in our case only to a limited extent – preference learning can indeed be of significant structural importance when conducting CE surveys. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Within a freight transport context, the origin-destination distance and the weight of the shipment play an important role in the decision of the most preferred transport service and in the way logistics managers evaluate the transport service's attributes. In particular, the attributes commonly used in order to describe a freight transport service in a stated choice framework are cost, time, punctuality and risk of damages, respectively. This paper investigates the role of origin-destination distance and weight of freight transport services introducing a conditioning effect, where the standard utility function is conditioned on the freight transport distance. We refer to this model form as a heteroskedastic panel multinomial logit (panel H-MNL) model. This model form outperforms the underlying unconditioned model and suggests that an appropriate conditioning effect leads to an improved understanding of the derived measures, such as measures for marginal rates of substitution. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: There is an extensive and growing literature on the design and use of stated choice experiments. Such experiments are generally regarded as the preferred framework within which to collect data to reveal the preferences of individuals in a particular application context. Analysts have developed sophisticated ways of analysing such data, typically using a form of discrete choice model that identifies the marginal (dis)utility associated with each observed attribute linked to an alternative, as well as accounting for sources of preference and scale heterogeneity. There is also a growing literature studying the attribute processing rules (or heuristics) that respondents use as a way of simplifying the task of choosing, for all manner of meaningful reason. We find that there is relatively less effort placed on looking closely at the data defining each choice situation for each respondent, as constructed by the stated choice experiment, and seeing if there exist 'evidential' rules that support in a plausible way, the choice responses. Heuristics investigated in this paper that might aid in our understanding of how choice scenarios are processed, leading to a choice outcome, include the role of dimensional vs. holistic attribute processing, the influence of relative attribute levels, and the revision of the reference alternative as value learning across sequenced choice sets. We find a high level of confidence in the evidence, and identify at least two features of choice set processing, namely value learning and majority of confirming dimensions, that are worthy of future inclusion in the estimation of all choice models. The evidence suggests that there is a great deal of behavioural sense in stated choice responses, for all manner of possible reason. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In this paper, we use the choice experiment method to investigate public preferences over alternative management regimes for a top-level predator in UK moorlands, the Hen Harrier. These birds are at the centre of a conflict between moorland managers and conservation organisations. Illegal killing of Hen Harriers on moorland managed for Red Grouse is considered to be one of the main factors limiting harrier population growth in the UK. Incentives for persecution arise due to the impacts of Hen Harriers on populations of Red Grouse, which are managed for commercial shooting. Numerous alternatives have been proposed to manage this system. We considered three which have emerged from stakeholder debates and scientific enquiry: tougher law enforcement, moving “excess” birds from grouse moors, and feeding of harriers. Results showed that respondents, sampled from the Scottish general public, were willing to pay both for avoiding reductions in harrier populations and for increases, but that these values were lower than those associated with equivalent changes for another raptor sharing the same moorland habitat, the Golden Eagle. Respondents valued a move away from current management, but were largely indifferent to which management option was taken up, suggesting that management options should be selected in terms of relative costs, and on who bears these costs. Differences within our sample of respondents in preferences across management options emerge when a latent class model is estimated. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The paper attempts to improve current understanding of the economic value of biodiversity. Instead of the prevailing approach of using only one indicator of biodiversity (typically, species richness) we provide evidence that it is possible to value changes in a number of attributes which describe complex characteristics of biodiversity, based on ecological knowledge. The attributes used include structural, species and functional diversity. The empirical application is a choice experiment study conducted in the Białowieża Forest, Poland: our study is therefore also one of the first to cast light on the value of biodiversity protection in Eastern Europe. Interestingly, respondents valued passive protection regimes resulting in preservation of natural ecological processes. In addition, the respondents seemed to be concerned with the means, and not only the results of protection programmes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper explores whether expert judgements can be taken as a proxy for citizen preferences for determining investment strategies for public goods. As an illustration, we focus on the provision of Public Rights Of Way (PROW) by Local Government Authorities in England. These provide rights of passage over property to those other than the owners, and little information is available on the welfare effects of changes in the provision and use of PROW. Given limited funds, reliance on expert judgement could be a cost effective alternative for decision-making compared with stated preference surveys of citizens. Two methods are compared. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used to elicit expert judgement to proxy citizen preferences for different attributes of PROW. The Choice Experiment (CE) technique is then used to derive preferences directly through personal interviews with citizens. Overall it was found that judicious use of AHP by experts can, in this instance, be used to represent citizen views. However, this result may not be easily generalisable to other settings. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper shows that cultural identity may have considerable influence on the WTP to protect natural resources. The Basque Country, the region with the highest ethnic homogeneity in Europe, serves as an example to illustrate how important this issue can be in the environmental valuation of natural resources. The rationale for this influence may be found in the deep roots of the Basque culture, a culture where amalurra (Mother Earth), i.e. the natural environment, has a central role, as studies from diverse disciplines such as anthropology, psychology and political science have shown. A simulated full distribution of the WTP to protect a Basque natural area using a random parameter logit model reveals that mean marginal WTP to protect its environmental attributes is approximately 43-50% higher if the respondent has children or if she is a climber and 28-33% higher if the cultural identity of the respondent is Basque. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The notion of hypothetical bias (HB) constitutes, arguably, the most fundamental issue in relation to the use of hypothetical survey methods. Whether or to what extent choices of survey participants and subsequent inferred estimates translate to real-world settings continues to be debated. While HB has been extensively studied in the broader context of contingent valuation, it is much less understood in relation to choice experiments (CE). While the number of CE studies has rapidly increased, the critical issue of HB has been studied in only a small fraction of CE studies. This paper provides macro-scale insights into the literature of CE and reviews the empirical evidence for HB in CE in various fields of applied economics as well as experimental psychology and behavioural neuroscience. Results suggest mixed evidence on the prevalence, extent and direction of HB as well as considerable context and measurement dependency. While HB is found to be an undeniable issue when conducting CEs, the empirical evidence on HB does not render CEs unable to represent real-world preferences. While health-related choice experiments often find negligible degrees of HB, experiments in consumer behaviour and transport domains suggest significant degrees of HB. Environmental valuation studies provide mixed evidence. Also, across these disciplines many studies display HB in their total willingness to pay estimates and opt-in rates but not in their hypothetical marginal rates of substitution (subject to scale correction). Further, recent findings in psychology and brain imaging studies identify neurocognitive mechanisms underlying HB that may explain some of the discrepancies and unexpected findings in the mainstream CE literature. • Empirical evidence on the prevalence of hypothetical bias in choice experiments is reviewed. • The survey integrates findings of consumer, health, environmental and transport economics. • Evidence from experimental psychology partly explain mechanisms of hypothetical bias. • Hypothetical bias is found to be an undeniable issue in relation to choice experiments. • The prevalence of significant bias varies considerably across disciplines and contexts of choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper looks at the question of whether subsistence level/indigenous people place a value on the preservation of ecosystems independent of direct impacts of environmental change, such as impacts on their production activities. The economics literature generally suggests that non-use values don''t exist among the poor and in the informal sector of the economy. We examine this issue through a choice modeling experiment. A survey was conducted of rainforest communities who live on the banks of the Amazon River (Rio Solimões), in the vicinity of proposed oil and gas pipelines. The data were analyzed in the choice modeling framework, revealing relatively high amounts of compensation that were necessary in order to accept the potential ecosystem damages associated with oil transport, even if the people were completely compensated for direct damages such as loss of access to productive resources. These results suggest that environmental quality is important for its own sake, a result that is very different from the implicit assumption among many economists. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper investigates the willingness to pay of a sample of residents of Bath, England, for a hypothetical program that promotes the production of renewable energy. Using choice experiments, we assess the preferences of respondents for a policy for the promotion of renewable energy that: (i) contributes to the internalization of the external costs caused by fossil fuel technologies; (ii) affects the short-term security of energy supply; (iii) has an impact on the employment in the energy sector; and (iv) leads to an increase in the electricity bill. Responses to the choice questions show that our respondents are in favour of a policy for renewable energy and that they attach a high value to a policy that brings private and public benefits in terms of climate change and energy security benefits. Our results therefore suggest that consumers are willing to pay a higher price for electricity in order to internalize the external costs in terms of energy security, climate change and air pollution caused by the production of electricity. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Stated choice experiments are widely used in many areas and the optimal allocation of options to choice sets can make a substantial difference to the cost of running such an experiment. In this paper we describe some open problems in the design of optimal stated choice experiments. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Livestock form key components of the livelihood strategies of many of the world''s poorest people. However, despite the potential to alleviate poverty and improve food security through livestock development interventions, the lack of smallholders'' participation in the planning and design of breeding programs has often been a major cause of the failure of such programs. Particularly in developing countries where livestock production is still mostly subsistence-oriented and livestock fulfil manifold functions a considerable number of livestock breeding programs have failed. The development of adequate tools to characterise these functions, bearing in mind that these are expressed only rarely in properly functioning markets, is therefore important. This paper seeks to advance the application of such methodologies to the smallholder pig sector in Vietnam. A choice experiment was applied across 140 households involved in pig breeding in order to assess farmers'' preferences and the trade-offs for a list of adaptive and productive traits. These included growth, reproduction, disease resistance, feed requirements and appearance. The findings indicate that smallholders highly value both adaptive and performance traits, particularly in resource-driven (i.e. subsistence) production systems. Performance traits were more highly valued in the demand-driven (i.e. market-oriented) systems. These findings have implications for breeding program breed choice and breeding objectives. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: By using hypothetical choice experiments, this paper presents evidence that individuals’ concern for relative consumption depends on their relative consumption. Individuals with consumption levels above society''s average consumption level tend to have, in general, lower concern for relative consumption. This supports Duesenberry''s [Duesenberry, J.S., 1949. Income, Saving, and the Theory of Consumer Behavior. Havard Univeristy Press, Cambridge, MA] notion that people are more concerned with upward social comparison than with downward social comparison. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper compares two methods for determining policy priorities for reform of Scottish agricultural support. Multifunctional agriculture attempts to establish a new balance between traditional commodity support and payment for the production of non-market goods and services that are increasingly demanded by the public. Supplying non-market goods presents particular problems for optimal policy design, not least the elicitation of consumer demand for those goods. From public focus groups, a range of attributes was derived as central to the Scottish public’s preferences for future agri-environmental reform. This information was then combined in two separate survey methods using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) and choice experiments (CE). Both applications suggest that the public has defined preferences and a willingness to pay (using general income taxation) to affect changes beyond the status quo, and that policy payments should be targeted towards both environmental and social benefits. The divergent preference orderings derived from the alternative methods can be considered in the light of previous methodological debates on question framing, bounded rationality and respondent uncertainty. We speculate about the validity of alternative methodologies for informing particular policy questions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Stated Choice (SC) methods, and other choice experiments, are now becoming increasingly popular for the valuation of environmental goods. This paper shows that lexicographic choices (LCs) in an SC task, or other types of choice experiments, do not imply that the respondent has lexicographic preferences. LCs may be a result of (i) study designs where differences between the alternatives are too great and (ii) simplification of the choice task. A traditional approach that investigates motives for lexicographic choices mainly as a result of lexicographic preferences may therefore fail to reveal the whole motive range. Study designs that cause LCs, whether such choices actually are based on non-compensatory choices (i.e. genuine lexicographic preferences or strategic behaviour) or compensatory choices, provide less information about preferences. However, providing they are not totally dominant, such choices are not normally a serious modeling problem. It is argued that simplification is a consequence of respondents'' differing abilities to choose. Such LCs contribute to the larger variances of SC data relative to less cognitively demanding valuation methods and might therefore have a significant impact on the implied valuation of non-market goods if they are not handled in the analysis. In data collection, we should use survey designs that collect more signals and less noise, and in data analysis we should use models that can separate signals from noise. However, there is obviously a limit to the amount of noise which can be separated from signals in a model and therefore how much noise such models can tolerate and still produce useful valuation estimates for the goods under consideration. For further investigation of such limits, a direct test procedure that can investigate whether each respondent has completed the task in a compensatory manner, like the one presented in the current study, is valuable. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The paper estimates the benefits of programmes to mitigate the off-site impacts of soil erosion for a watershed in Andalusia, Spain. Two stated preference methods are used, namely choice experiments and contingent valuation, to obtain estimates of the social benefit from soil erosion reductions under two different methodologies. We emphasise the relative merits of the choice experiment method to provide useful inputs to policy design. However, employing both methods allows us to undertake a convergent validity test and thus to provide more defensible social benefit estimates. The attributes used in the choice experiment include water quality impacts (which we find to have the highest marginal values), impacts on wildlife and the area subject to a control programme. The contingent valuation design includes an attempt to reduce bias by reminding respondents about substitutes. Results are used to suggest upper limits on per hectare payments for soil conservation programmes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Policy makers have responded to concerns over declining levels of biodiversity by introducing a range of policy measures including agri-environment and wildlife management schemes. Costs for such measures are relatively easy to establish, but benefits are less easily estimated. Economics can help guide the design of biodiversity policy by eliciting public preferences on different attributes of biodiversity. However, this is complicated by the generally low level of awareness and understanding of what biodiversity means on the part of the general public. In this paper we report research that applied the choice experiment and contingent valuation methods to value the diversity of biological diversity. Focus groups were used to identify ecological concepts of biodiversity that were important and relevant to the public, and to discover how best to describe these concepts in a meaningful and understandable manner. A choice experiment examined a range of biodiversity attributes including familiarity of species, species rarity, habitat, and ecosystem processes, while a contingent valuation study examined public willingness to pay for biodiversity enhancements associated with agri-environmental and habitat re-creation policy. The key conclusions drawn from the valuation studies were that the public has positive valuation preferences for most, but not all, aspects of biodiversity, but that they appeared to be largely indifferent to how biodiversity protection was achieved. Finally, we also investigate the extent to which valuation workshop approaches to data collection can overcome some of the possible information problems associated with the valuation of complex goods. The key conclusion was that the additional opportunities for information exchange and group discussion in the workshops helped to reduce the variability of value estimates. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Assessing public preferences for natural resources is a difficult task. The complexity of the research problem has encouraged practitioners to adopt qualitative approaches as exploratory and diagnostic tools within the conventionally more quantitative stated preference research. Building on best practice from previous studies, this paper reports the findings of post-questionnaire focus group analysis, investigating the adequacy of a choice experiment (CE) valuation exercise and its public acceptability. The specifics of the scenario and design choices are shown to markedly reduce problems of charity like and bid-realism/fair-share responses, observed in previous studies, and significant sensitivity to good characteristics is observed. However, a less tractable problem of valuing unfamiliar goods remains, with insights given regarding public acceptability and the usefulness of the findings to environmental decision-making. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper has two objectives. The first is to estimate the value of implementing new coastal and marine conservation measures in Vietnam, focussing on the relative benefits of water quality improvements, coral conservation and control of marine plastic pollution. The second is to explicitly model any tendency of respondents to fail to give consideration to the "opt-out" or status quo option in a choice experiment, due to social and cultural factors. The analysis employs the independent availability logit model with random coefficients to simultaneously account for heterogeneity of preferences and choice set formation. Results show significantly improved model fit when consideration set heterogeneity is taken into account. However, estimates of preference weights and marginal willingness to pay for marine conservation measures are unaffected by this modelling choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Domestic food waste (DFW) is an important policy issue because it represents inefficiencies in supply chains and consumption behaviour, creates pressures on urban landfills, and causes downstream environmental impacts such as greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and odour from landfills. However, the evaluation of proposals to minimise or treat food waste, such as through separate disposal streams, is difficult because those impacts are not registered through normal market price signals. This paper presents non-market valuations for a hypothetical kerbside DFW collection service from a survey of households in two local government areas in the Central Queensland region, Australia. Choice modelling (CM) and contingent valuation methods (CVM) were employed to elicit potential participation and estimate willingness to pay (WTP) of the community for a domestic food waste collection service. Latent class analysis results for the sub-groups supporting an improvement option revealed that cost, odour and fortnightly collection frequency limit both WTP for and participation in the potential kerbside collection program. While there was support because it would extend the lifespans of the local landfills, potential reduction of methane emissions was not a strong driver. No difference in support or willingness to pay could be identified between the two local government populations. While the CVM results showed a WTP of $30.42 and a 58% participation rate for the proposed option, the latent class models showed that potential participation and willingness to pay varied across negative, indifference and positive sub-samples. This study provides a useful example of how a new policy option to improve waste management at a local area level might be evaluated, where the willingness to pay estimates can be factored into a benefit cost analysis and the estimates of likely support or opposition can be inputted into a political economy framework. • The study assessed household preferences to reduce domestic food waste. • Stated preference experiments were used to estimate WTP for reduction options. • Behavioural and attitudinal factors were important in explaining choices. • Two-stage contingent valuation models estimated both participation and WTP. • Latent class analysis models were used to classify responses to key attributes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]