Valuation Of Natural Capital Of Water Resourse In Wei River

Wei River is one of the largest tributary of the yellow river, also is the biggest riverin Shaanxi province. The environmental regulation and support effects comes with WeiRiver are significant and obvious. The Wei River go through Baoji, Xianyang, Xi’anand Weinan city, which are the core of the Guanzhong economy region, Shaanxi province.Because of this specialty, Wei River obtained great attentions on its natural resource andthe effects on economic development in river basin from natural resource economists.To use and protect the cyclic development of natural capital in Wei River wisely,the priority is to focus on the valuation of the natural capital to evaluate the speed of naturalcapital consume and regrow more accurate. Then, build up a reasonable and effectiveprotection and management policy. Because of the longtime ignorance of the non-marketingpart in natural capital, the valuation lack of comprehensive. This thesis build up thevaluation of natural capital upon one of the most efficient valuation method, ChoiceModeling. By using the method of Choice modelling, explored the willingness to pay ofwater resource’s natural capital of residents live in Wei River basin and calculated thevalue of water resource natural capital in Wei River. Moreover, this study provided evidenceand indicators which should be focused on, with suggestions on policy making.Based on the theory of Choice Modelling, we built up a questionnaire and used faceto face survey to acquire data, then accumulated to bring out the willingness to pay ofnatural capital of residents in four cities on Wei River basin.888questionnaires weredelivered with811valid, effective rate is90.1%. Through the pre-investigation and refineof the final version of questionnaire, the rationality and effectiveness of question sets ofquestionnaire had been ensured.After acquired the data, I calculated the marginal willingness to pay of water resourcenatural capital of Wei River by simulating and analyzing with mixed logit model, andcalculated total willingness to pay and the preference of residents. To achieve the goalof “The Plan of Comprehensive Treatment of Wei River”, such as refine the water qualityto level Ⅲ, the residents in Wei River basin should have willingness to pay of317.52yuanper year per family. The most significant preference natural capital indexes in model aresoil erosion intensity and water quantity per capita in Wei River, while the most week preference are natural landscape, ecological tourism and conditions in natural park. Thepossible causes of this phenomenon are: The economic development of Wei River basinin Shaanxi province is most supported by agriculture and the intensity of soil erosion andwater quantity per capita have a strong affection on agricultural production improvement;since natural landscape, ecological tourism and conditions in natural park are more approachof the enjoyment of vision and life, which is slightly out of line with economic development,so the residents’ willingness to pay is lower.The analysis of willingness to pay of natural capital of residents in Wei River basinproved that the concentration of Wei River management should be put on water quantityinsurance and afforestation protection along the river to promote the comprehensive treatmentof water and soil loss. While improving environment, the insurance of agriculture productionand economic development could enhance the efficiency of policy implementation.According to different regions, the diversity of environment should be conclude in policymaking consideration and emphasis on establishing distinguishing environmental controlmeasurements. Strengthen the consciousness of environmental protection, especially onbroadcasting of methods on reasonable utility and protection of water resource, to promoteconsciousness of water resource of rural residents.