Essays on agricultural externalities and benefit transfer of recreational fishing value (Ohio)

This dissertation explores the physical and economic aspects of agricultural externalities and the economic value of marine and stream recreational fishing.; The first essay, Empirical Investigation of Agricultural Externalities. Effects of Pesticide Use and Tillage System on Surface Water Quality and Treatment Costs, focuses on the off-farm water quality and water treatment cost effects of upstream and nearby agricultural practices (pesticide use and tillage system), specifically on the pesticide contamination in finished public surface water and water treatment costs in the Maumee River Basin, a major tributary to Lake Erie, located in northwestern Ohio, northeastern Indiana, and southeastern Michigan. Pesticide contamination level in treated surface water and average chemical cost of treating surface water are related to farming practices and other environmental variables. Findings indicate significant relationships between farming practices and both surface water quality and treatment costs. Average chemical cost per million gallons of water decreases by 1.95% for a 1% reduction in pesticide application, while pesticide contamination level decreases by 4.32% for a 1% more adoption of conservation tillage in a typical watershed area in the Maumee River Basin.; The second essay, The Economic Value of Marine Recreational Fishing: Applying Benefit Transfer to Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistics Survey (MRFSS), conducts a comprehensive survey of benefit transfer techniques including historical background, methodologies, and procedures. Then, benefit transfer technique is applied to the estimation of access value to fishing sites and willingness to pay for better fishing experience in a marine recreational fishing environment of the coastal states in the Northeast and Southeast U.S. Using 1994 Northeast and 1997 Southeast MRFSS data, benefit transfer estimates are compared with original value estimates to empirically examine the validity of benefit transfer. Although benefit transfer error could go up to over 400% of original estimates for some cases, the magnitude of benefit transfer error is less than 100% of original estimates for most cases. Since two data sets used for benefit transfer exercise are from different regions and years, whether regional or temporal variation is more responsible for benefit transfer error can not be determined with current data.; The third essay, Recreational Fishing Value Estimation of Water Quality Improvements in Western Ohio Using Benefit Transfer, presents methods for estimating the value of recreational fishing trips and water quality improvements in two watersheds supporting a warm freshwater recreational fishery, the Stillwater River Watershed and Maumee River Basin, in western Ohio using benefit transfer. These two watersheds are further disaggregated into several local stream segments within the watersheds to provide regional results for larger watersheds and to help local policy makers target their efforts more efficiently and effectively. Findings are that annual recreational fishing benefits of water quality improvements are {dollar}2,255,616 ({dollar}2,759,225 or {dollar}3,966,716) and {dollar}6,236,853 ({dollar}5,395,609 or {dollar}7,171,617) with about {dollar}44 ({dollar}54 or {dollar}77) and {dollar}58 ({dollar}50 or {dollar}66) of annual per angler benefits using average value transfer (two function transfer) estimates in the Stillwater River Watershed and Maumee River Basin respectively. These estimates along with disaggregated results in terms of local stream segments and angler types could serve as an initial set of approximated recreational benefits of any local environmental policy involving water quality improvement in inland streams and rivers, at least in terms of recreational fishing. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)...