Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

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Global Ecology and Conservation

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/gecco

Willingness to pay for forest conservation: Evidence from a

contingent valuation survey analysis in Southwest Ethiopia
Diriba Abdeta a, *, Alemayehu N. Ayana a, Yadeta Bekele b
a
Ethiopian Forestry Development, P.O. Box 24536, Code 1000, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
b
Jimma University College of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, Jimma, Ethiopia

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Forests are the major source of biodiversity and ecosystem services, on which millions of liveli­
Contingent valuation method hoods depend. In Ethiopia, forests play a crucial role in the livelihoods of rural communities by
Double-bounded dichotomous choice providing various goods and ecosystem services such as timber, non-timber forest products, water
Ethiopia
resources, and environmental conservation. Despite these benefits, the forests of the country have
Willingness to pay
Forest conservation
been subject to continuous degradation, which calls for sustainable conservation. Effective public
participation in conservation activities is an important intervention to consider for successful
conservation efforts. This paper aims to estimate households’ mean willingness to pay (WTP) both
in money/cash and labour time for the conservation of Belete-Gera forest in southwest Ethiopia
and to identify determinants of WTP. To address the objectives, survey data was collected from
193 sample households using a double-bounded contingent valuation (CV) format followed by
open-ended questions. A bivariate probit model estimation result indicates that the annual mean
WTP in monetary values or cash was 167.23 Birr ($4.88) per household, while the annual mean
willingness to contribute in labour (WTCL) was 49.66 man-days per household. The finding
supports the contribution in labour as a payment vehicle for future CV studies, particularly when
applied to low-income households. The result indicates that age of the household head, gender
(male), education level, income, and training on forest conservation are statistically significant
and have a positive effect on WTP in money, whereas bids offered have negative effects. For the
labour bidding case, gender of the household head (male), land holding size, and training on
forest conservation are statistically significant and increase households’ WTCL, while dependency
ratio, a distance of the residential place from the forest, and bids in labour showed significant
negative effects. The estimated results suggest that the local community supports the conservation
of the forest, implying that, despite their low-income, rural households are willing to contribute
considerable amounts of resources for the proposed conservation program in the study area. Thus,
it is suggested that government and development partners need to consider the potential of labour
contributions by local communities in conservation policies.

1. Introduction

Millions of communities living in and around forests rely on ecosystem’s goods and services for their livelihoods. The forestry sector
contributes significantly to the national economy and households’ livelihoods in Ethiopia. For instance, the forestry sector contributed

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: abdinkoyes7@gmail.com (D. Abdeta).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gecco.2023.e02551
Received 19 February 2023; Received in revised form 13 June 2023; Accepted 21 June 2023
Available online 22 June 2023
2351-9894/© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

about US$ 16.7 billion (111.2 billion Ethiopian Birr (ETB)), which accounts for about 12.86 % of the national Gross Domestic Product
(GDP) values during July 2012 to June 2013 (UNEP, 2016). Out of this value of the forest contribution to GDP, about US$ 0.36 (2.4
billion ETB) was attributed to Ethiopian households’ willingness to pay (WTP) for conservation of the forests (ibid.). Although the
forests provide a significant economic contribution, deforestation, and forest degradation have been persistent challenges in Ethiopia,
mainly in the northern and central parts of the country, where human settlements and subsistence farming have altered the envi­
ronment (Lemenih and Kassa, 2014; Fikreyesus et al., 2022). For instance, Ethiopian forest suffered a mean annual net forest loss of 73,
000 ha (ha) per year between 2000 and 2013 (FRL, 2017).
As an alternative strategy to combat deforestation and forest degradation, the government of Ethiopia has shown meaningful
commitment to expanding forest coverage and enhancing the contribution of forests to the green economy (Abdeta, 2022a). This is
intended to expand the forest coverage from 17.35 million ha of forests, which covered about 15.7 % of the country’s land area in 2015,
to 30 % by 2030 (Ministry of Environment, Forest, and Climate Change (MEFCC, 2018)). Moreover, the ambitious Green Legacy
Initiative (GLI), which the Ethiopian government launched in 2019, aims to plant about 20 billion tree seedlings within four-year
periods, with an overall performance of 25 billion tree seedlings by 2022 (https://sdgs.un.org/partnerships/green-legacy-initiative).
The remaining natural high forests in Ethiopia have been mainly limited to the southeastern and southwestern parts of the country.
The southwestern Ethiopian forests are one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots, and it is a place where Arabica coffee originated and
was first domesticated (Anthony et al., 2002; Senbeta and Denich, 2006; Fole, 2018). These forests are habitats for various species of
flora and fauna and sources of ecosystem services, which include forest coffee, spices, forest honey, and other varieties of timber and
non-timber forest products (NTFPs) on which millions of smallholder farmers’ livelihoods depend (Senbeta and Denich, 2006; Tadesse
et al., 2014; Mertens et al., 2018). Despite all these ecological and economic benefits, these forests are continuously changing as a
result of intensified coffee management in the forest areas (Schmitt et al., 2010; Tadesse et al., 2014) and have been transformed into
coffee agroforests, which are largely managed by smallholders (Aerts et al., 2011; Hwang et al., 2020).
Belete-Gera forest is part of the southwest Ethiopian forests, which have been experiencing significant challenges of deforestation
(Takahashi and Otsuka, 2016; Takahashi and Todo, 2017; Hwang et al., 2020). This forest is owned by government and local com­
munities have a restricted use right to the forest. However, weak implementation of forest policies and inadequate management
intervention from the government led to open access situation, where activities such as illegal logging, grazing in the forest, illegal
settlements, and expanding coffee plantations are taking place in the forest. Thus, anthropogenic factors, including the expansion of
coffee agroforests and livestock grazing (Takahashi and Otsuka, 2016), are major causes of forest degradation in Belete-Gera forest
areas. A time series analysis of 32 years Landsat data (1987–2019) by Hwang et al. (2020) reveals a clear trend of forest degradation
levels in the Belete-Gera forest. Thus, the present trend of forest degradation could lead to excessive loss of forest ecosystems unless
timely and effective intervention is taken to combat the degradation problem. This implies a demand for implementation intervention
for sustainable management and conservation of this critical forest.
Implementing conservation policies and combating forest degradation require sufficient financial and human resources. Most forest
landscape restoration projects in Ethiopia have been driven primarily by external funds and supported by several bilateral donors and
government budgets to some extent. However, insufficient financing and unsustainable conservation interventions are among the main
challenges to tackling environmental (forest) degradation in the country (Battistelli et al., 2022; Wiegant et al., 2023). The budget
allocated by the government for the forestry sector is inadequate due to critical competition from other public sectors, which are highly
prioritized during government budget allocation. This suggests a need for additional funding sources beyond those provided by the
government and external donors. Thus, it is required to find alternative domestic sources of financing for the sustainable conservation
of the forest. Hence, increasing the involvement of the local community in forest conservation activities through their willingness to
contribute resources is a crucial point for achieving this objective. This is in line with forest conservation policy in Ethiopia in general
and the Belete-Gera forest in particular, which is centered on a community-based forest management approach. This approach rec­
ognizes the importance of involving local communities in the conservation and sustainable utilization of forest resources.
In light of this, it is important to examine local communities’ preferences and willingness to contribute resources for the forest
conservation program in the study area. A holistic approach, the contingent valuation method (CVM), is applied to estimate the
conservation value of forests by directly asking respondents how much they are willing to pay (WTP),1 both in money and labour time,
for the proposed forest conservation program in the Belete-Gera forest. Unlike most of the previous CV studies, which only used the
monetary payment vehicle, this paper significantly contributes to the limited knowledge regarding the use of non-monetary payment
vehicles by incorporating labour time contributions in the estimation of households’ WTP for the protection and management of
forests.
The specific objectives of this study are to: (i) estimate rural households’ mean WTP in both money and labour time for the
conservation of Belete-Gera forest, and (ii) identify the main determinant variables for households’ WTP for forest conservation in the
study area. The remaining parts of this paper are structured as follows: Section 2 presents a review of different relevant literature on
willingness to pay elicitation and highlights the existing research gap on the topic. Section 3 highlights the research methodology used.
Section 4 deals with the results, while Section 5 presents discussions and the policy implications of the findings. The last section
provides the conclusion and recommendations.

1
The study used "willingness to pay" (WTP) to refer to households’ willingness to contribute both money (Birr) and labour time (man-days) for
forest conservation, except where it is specified as "willingness to pay in money" (WTPM) and "willingness to contribute in labour" (WTCL).

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2. Willingness to pay estimation

In estimating willingness to pay, selecting appropriate payment vehicles is an important. The standard monetary payment is a
commonly used payment vehicle in estimating WTP for environmental resources (Abdeta, 2022b). However, using the usual monetary
payment as the sole payment mode in the context of developing economies poses numerous problems and leads to inaccurate WTP
value estimations (Gibson et al., 2016; Vondolia and Navrud, 2019; Kassahun et al., 2020). In a subsistence economy or lower-income
community, households may encounter cash limitations that prevent them from revealing their actual preferences for the resources
being valued. Consequently, the resulting WTP estimate is inaccurate and could lead to an underestimation of the true value of the
good or attribute under consideration. This may possibly lead to the depletion of the natural resources in question and influence land
use plans in ways that are inconsistent with optimizing economic well-being (Kramer et al., 2003). Additionally, households with
lower incomes may be inexperienced with the monetary payments, which can create a hypothetical bias for the desired welfare
measure of given environmental resources (Gibson et al., 2016; Vondolia and Navrud, 2019).
To address the issues that arise from the mere application of monetary payment in the context of developing economies, prior
studies have employed alternative payment vehicles such as kilograms of rice and crop or maize (Mekonnen, 2000; Aktera et al., 2007),
labour-meals (Iason et al., 2017), and labour time (Echessah et al., 1997; Eom and Larson, 2006; Navrud and Vondolia, 2020). Among
these, labour time is the most frequently used non-monetary mode of payment in stated preference studies (Hung et al., 2007; Solikin,
2017; Vondolia and Navrud, 2019; Meginnis et al., 2020). However, almost all of the earlier CV studies conducted on this topic in
Ethiopia failed to include labour and only used money as a payment vehicle in their attempt to estimate WTP values (Gelo and Koch,
2015; Negewo et al., 2016; Amare et al., 2016; Aseres and Sira, 2020). For instance, recent review studies by (Abdeta, 2022a, 2022b)
examined prior forest-based CV studies conducted in developing economies and revealed that only a small proportion of the evaluated
studies included non-monetary modes of payment in WTP value estimations. Thus, this study is aimed at contributing to closing this
research gap by including labour time as well as monetary payment for the proposed forest conservation project in the study area.
However, using labour-time contributions to solve liquidity constraints in welfare measures has several problems. Unlike the
monetary payment, labour time is not a homogenous good and may have diverse values depending on when and where it is imple­
mented. For instance, Ahlheim et al. (2017) urge that, although avoiding the budget constraint, the use of labour time as a payment
vehicle could create two main biases: (1) arising from imprecise specification of the work to be done in the proposed project; and (2)
the problem of converting stated labour to equivalent monetary values, which is helpful in a cost-benefit analysis (CBA). To solve the
first problem, we specified a precise list of works to be done in the proposed conservation program (e.g., guarding, cleaning, planting

Fig. 1. Locational map of the study area.

Source: Authors’ sketch (2021) using Ethiopia map shape file 2013.

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

trees, management work) and included it in the CV survey questionnaire. The second problem was solved by applying the national
minimum wage rate for public workers (guards and laborers) for conversion rate, as used by another related previous study (Tilahun
et al., 2015).

3. Methodology

3.1. Study area

Belete-Gera Forest is located in Shabe Sombo and Gera districts of Jimma Zone, southwest Oromia, Ethiopia. Geographically, the
districts are found between 7◦ 0’ and 8◦ 0’ N latitudes and 36◦ 0’ and 36◦ 40’ E longitudes. The region is between 1300 and 3000 m
above sea level. The annual rainfall varies from 1800 to 2300 mm, with maximum precipitation in the June and September months.
The average annual lowest and highest temperatures of the region are 5 and 22 ◦ C, respectively (Yasin et al., 2018). According to the
2007 national census report, Shebe Sombo Woreda had a total population of 112,068. While Gera district has nearly 130,000 residents
(CSA, 2012), as noted by Ango et al. (2014), it has a population density of 90 people per square kilometer. About half of the districts are
covered by forests, although the level of forest cover has decreased over the last few decades (Hylander et al., 2013). From the total
area in the district, a greater portion of land is covered by coffee, and the rest of the land is allocated for crop production. Maize and teff
are among the main cultivated crops in the area, while honey, beef, and root crop production are also commonly practiced.
Plant species such as Syzygium guineense, Olea welwitschii, Prunus africana, and Pouteria adolfi-friedericii are the dominant
species in the Afromontane evergreen climax forest of Belete-Gera (Demissew et al., 2004). At 1400–3000 m altitude, the forest covers
more than 1500 km2. At an altitude of 2000 m, the yearly average temperature and rainfall are 18.4 ◦ C and 1780 mm, respectively
(Mertens et al., 2018). Coffee Arabica originated in Belete-Gera forest, and local communities that inhabit the forest areas collect
coffee, forest honey, spices, bush meat, and medicinal plants from the natural forest. Patches of naturally occurring forests combined
with intensely cultivated forest coffee are found within Belete-Gera forest (Mertens et al., 2018). To achieve effective forest man­
agement, Belete-Gera forest has been under participatory forest management (PFM) since 2003, and currently, the forest is under the
concession of a state-run enterprise, the Oromia Forest and Wildlife Enterprises (OFWE). Belete-Gera forest is rich in biodiversity
(Schmitt et al., 2010), and it is crucial for the preservation of biodiversity and socio-economic contribution (Yasin et al., 2018). A map
showing location of the study area is presented in Fig. 1 below.

3.2. Data collection and sampling techniques

This study used data collection methods such as surveys (questionnaires), observation, key informant interviews (KIIs), and focus
group discussions (FDGs). The KII was used for collecting data on the main causes of forest degradation and options for sustainable
conservation of the forest. Johnston et al. (2017) recommend conducting a minimum of four to six FDGs for most applications of stated
preference (SP) studies. Following this, six (6) FGDs (one FDG in each selected kebele2) were conducted to identify initial bid value and
refine the questionnaire.
Besides, a survey pretest was conducted to identify optimal sets of bids and test the questionnaire (i.e., test the plausibility of the
scenario, select appropriate wording, and order the questions). Connelly (2008) recommends having the pretest survey be 10 % of the
proposed sample for the larger study, whereas Hill (1998) suggests 10–30 participants for survey research. Following these recom­
mendations, the survey pre-test was conducted on 20 randomly selected households that were not included in the final main survey in
the study area. After making revisions to the draft questionnaire, we developed a final questionnaire that was used for the main data
collection. The final data for this study was collected by four experienced enumerators using a semi-structured questionnaire through
face-to-face interviews from October to November 2021.
A multistage sampling technique was employed to draw samples from the population of this study. At the initial stage, 18 rural
kebeles (i.e., eight (8) kebeles from 20 kebeles in Shabe Sombo and 10 kebeles from 24 kebeles in Gera) districts were purposively
selected. This was done based on the kebeles’ proximity to Belete-Gera forest areas and the greater attachment of households’ live­
lihoods to the forest ecosystems. Second, from the 18 kebeles selected at the first stage, six (6) sample kebeles (three (3) kebeles from
each district) were selected using a proportional simple random sampling method. In the third stage, using stratified random sampling
techniques, households within the sampled six kebeles were stratified into two strata: members of a locally established forest man­
agement association called WaBuB3 and non-WaBuB. ‘WaBuB’ refers to a locally established forest management association that stands
for “Waldaa Bulchiinsa Bosonaa”, abbreviated as ‘WaBuB’ in ‘Afaan Oromo4’.
The need for stratification of the sample household into members and non-members of WaBuB is to make the population homo­
geneous and ensure the representativeness of the selected sample. This is required as there are a greater number of WaBuB members
and a smaller number of non-WaBuB members in the sampled kebeles. Thus, if the sample was not stratified, the proportion of
members and non-member households would not be properly represented. This could inflate the WTP estimates as the WaBuB member

2
‘Kebele’ is the smallest administrative unit in Ethiopia
3
WaBuB is a local forest management association that was established in September 2003 as a means of participatory forest management at
Belete-Gera Forest Priority Areas.
4
‘Afaan Oromo’ also known as the Oromo language is a native language of the Ethiopian State of Oromia and spoken predominantly by the
Oromo people and neighboring ethnic groups in the Horn of Africa.

4
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households are more connected to forest benefits and support conservation of the forest through more resource contributions for the
proposed program relative to the non-member households, who may perceive conservation as a cost and be less likely to contribute to
the program. Thus, to overcome these issues, households were stratified to ensure sample representation and obtain accurate WTP
value estimates for the proposed conservation program. The required sample size for this study is determined using Yamane (1967)
sample size determination formula for proportions, which can be presented as:
N
n= (1)
1 + N(e)2

where n = sample size, N = size of the target population, and e = level of precision.
Finally, a total of 196 sample households were selected randomly using a simple random sampling probability proportional to the
household size in each stratum (Table 1).

3.3. Questionnaire design, survey pretesting, and bid designs

Contingent valuation survey questionnaire design is a fundamental issue to ascertain validity of a CVM study, as the method has
been under critics for the validity of its value estimates. For example, Carson (2000) reveals that CVM criticisms can be generally
categorized into two main aspects: (i) a philosophical aspect that doubts the inclusivity of the passive use value; and (ii) a technical
aspect that focuses on methods of design and conducting CV research. A recent systematic review study conducted by Abdeta (2022b)
reveals that most previous forest-based CV studies in the setting of developing economies lack appropriate design and execution of
surveys and suggests a need for the proper design and implementation as per recommended in CV literature. Thus, we followed a set of
recommended best practice guidelines in the stated preference literature (e.g., Arrow et al., 1993; Riera et al., 2012; DeShazo et al.,
2015; Johnston et al., 2017) in designing the CV survey questionnaire to overcome the second problem. A questionnaire for this study
has been categorized into three sections: (1) the CV scenario, which deals with the description of the resources to be valued, the
ecosystem services of the forest and the importance of its conservation, and the need for households’ resource contributions for
conservation of the forest; (2) socio-demographic questions, physical asset ownership questions, and households’ expenditures; and (3)
valuation questions.
In the CV survey implementation, especially double-bounded dichotomous choice (DBDC), optimal bid setting is the main point to
be given attention. Survey pretesting has a great advantage in determining optimal bid sets in CV surveys (Riera et al., 2012; Johnston
et al., 2017). Accordingly, a pilot study was conducted on 20 randomly selected households in which open-ended elicitation questions
were used to obtain WTP distributions for both WTPM and WTCL biddings. The responses obtained from the pretest survey range from
50 to 500 ETB5 per year, with a higher concentration at the left (lower point) for the case of WTPM bidding. While the stated bid values
vary from 15 to 200 man-days per year for the WTCL bidding cases. A non-parametric test of kernel density function estimation was
used to fit the observed data points to the underlying probability distributions.
The probability density value for observations higher than 400 Birr bid values is close to zero for WTPM, and the probability density
value for observations greater than 150 man-days bid values approaches zero for the WTCL case. Based on these results, five initial bid
sets were selected for the close-ended dichotomous choice format valuation questions in each WTPM and WTCL bidding. Accordingly,
five initial bid sets (50, 90, 130, 170, and 210) Birr per year were selected for WTPM bidding, whereas five initial bids (15, 35, 50, 75,
and 90) man days were determined for the WTCL bidding case (Table 2). Hence, the determined bid sets were randomly assigned to the
sampled households, which are divided into almost equal five groups for both biddings. Based on (‘Yes’-‘No’) responses to the offered
initial bids, higher or lower bid amounts from the bid vectors were offered as follow-up questions. As indicated in Table 2, the follow-
up bids were doubled for a ‘Yes’ response to the first (initial) bid and halved for those who responded ‘No’ to the initial bid offered.
Finally, open-ended question formats were used to estimate respondents’ maximum WTP for the proposed conservation program.
There are several theories that can be applied to explain individuals’ WTP for public environmental goods and services. However,
in economics, the theory underpinning CVM is a consumer behavior theory. According to Hoehn (1991), economic benefits from any
proposed environmental change could theoretically be represented by household expenditure functions. In line with this, the term
“household”, which is the analyzing unit for the study, is used instead of “individual” in this study. The present study is grounded on a
random utility theory (McFadden, 1974; Hanemann, 1984) for the analysis of households’ preferences and WTP for the proposed
conservation program in the study area. In a contingent valuation survey, respondents are requested to identify a required change in
income level given a proposed change in the level of public goods that would keep his/her utility unaltered. This is known as
compensating surplus (CS) in economics, which is a change in a consumer’s or household’s income that keeps him/her at the same
utility level after the change in environmental resources occurs. Hence, the utility (Ui) that the households derive from a ‘Yes-No’
response to CVM questions consists of the observable deterministic component (Vi) and the unobservable random component (i),
which can be the unobservable parts of the respondent’s characteristics and attributes of the commodities (environmental resources
dealing with; forest conservation in this case):
Ui = Vi + εi (2)

where the index i denotes the alternatives Yes (i = 1) and No (i = 0). If the household responded ‘Yes’ to the CV question, he/she

5
ETB (Ethiopian Birr) is a currency used in Ethiopia and interchangeably used with ‘Birr’ in this study.

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Table 1
Total numbers of households and sampled household size with their proportions in each stratum of the sampled kebeles.
Sampled Kebeles Total number of household heads Households size Sampled Household size

WaBuB Non WaBuB WaBuB Non WaBuB

Mergano Boso 984 625 359 25 14

Atero Gefere 884 553 331 22 13
Sombo Doru 467 292 175 11 7
Gere Ifalo 976 642 334 25 13
Garanaso 895 580 315 23 12
Amina Dacho 783 451 332 18 13
Total 4989 3143 1846 124 72

Source: Authors’ calculation (2021), depending on data from Shebe Sombo and Gera Districts’ Administration Offices (2020/21)

Table 2
Bids design and number of sample households randomly distributed to each bid level.
Bid amounts (ETB year-1) Bid amounts (Man days year-1)
a
[Lower, Initial, Higher bids] N % [Lower, Initial, Higher bids] N %

[25, 50, 100] 41 21.24 [8, 15, 30] 67 34.72

[45, 90, 180] 38 19.69 [18, 35, 70] 35 18.13
[65, 130, 260] 41 21.24 [25, 50, 100] 31 16.06
[85, 170, 340] 36 18.65 [38, 75, 150] 29 15.03
[105, 210, 420] 37 19.17 [45, 90, 180] 31 16.06

N = Numbers
a
The lower bids are sets of bids that have offered if response to the initial (middle) bids is ‘No’, and the higher bid is assigned if respondents
answered ‘Yes’ to the initial bids.Theoretical framework and estimation approach

accepts conservation of the environmental resources (conservation of Belete-Gera forest, in this case), and his/her income will be
decreased by the magnitude of the bid price accepted. With the assumption that the household is intending to maximize utility function
within his/her given income constraints Yi, households drive utility from the conservation of natural resources (Belete-Gera forest
conservation program), denoted by Q, and other observable attributes that may affect his/her preferences (i.e., socio-economic
characteristics, namely; gender, age, training access on environmental resource conservation, etc.), which is denoted by vector S.
Hence, following Hanemann (1984), the jth respondent will likely to accept the assigned initial bid merely for the following condition:
( )
U1j Y1j − T1j ; S1j ; Q1 + ε1j ≥ U0j (Yj ; Sj ; Q0 ) + ε0j (3)

Where U1j and U0j denote indirect utility for the state of Belete-Gera forest conservation program Q1 and the status quo Q0, respectively.
If Q1 is higher than Q0, this implies higher non-marketed benefits from the conservation program instead of the status quo. Yj represents
household income if the offered bid, Tj, is presented in money, whereas Yj is leisure time if the bid offered is in the form of labour-time
contribution (Eom and Larson, 2006). Sj comprises respondents’ preferences and socio-economic variables. Here, it is presumed that ε1j
and ε0j are i.i.d. with a mean ‘0’ and variance ‘1’.
Hence, the jth respondent/household will respond ‘Yes’ to CV questions only if the condition under Eq. (3) is satisfied and reject it
otherwise. The household knows definitely which choice alternative maximizes his/her utility; however, for the econometric inves­
tigator, the household’s response is a random variable whose probability distribution (the probability of a ‘Yes’ response) will be given
by:
( )
Prj Yes) = Prj (V1 (Yj − Tj ; Sj ; Q1 + ε1j > V0 (Yj ; Sj ; Q0 ) + ε0j
(( ( ) )
= Pr V1 Yj − Tj ; Sj ; Q1 − V0 (Yj ; Sj ; Q0 ) > ε0j − ε1j (4)

By defining η = ε0j - ε1j, ΔV=V1j-V0j, and let Fη(ΔV) be a CDF of η. The probability of ‘Yes’ (Prj (Yes)) response can be rewritten as:
Prj (Yes) = Fη(ΔV) (5)

The deterministic part of the utility function (Vj) comprises a constant (α), income variable (Y), other socio-economic character­
istics (S), and bid attributes (T), which are in US$ (ETB6) and man-days for the monetary and labour-time contributions, respectively.
The random component is represented by εj. Hence, the underlying utility level associated with the two options, i.e., with the proposed
Belete-Gera forest conservation program and without the program, is given by:
V1j = α1 + (Yj − Tj) + ε1

6
ETB stands for Ethiopian Birr (also simply called Birr); a unit of currency being used in Ethiopia.

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

V0 = α0 + (Yj) + ε0 (6)

ΔV = (α1 − α0) − βTj + ε1 − ε0

where vector Sj is suppressed with the other socio-economic characteristics. Defining α=α1- α0, the statistical discrete choice model,
which is probability of a ‘Yes’ response, Pr (Yes) becomes:
Pr(Yes) = Fη(α − βTj) (7)
Assuming a normal distribution of the cumulative distribution η, and assumed difference in the error terms (εi), the probability of
Yes response:
Pr(Yes) = Φ (α − βTj) (8)

Where Φ = the normal cumulative distribution function, β = parametric estimate of the bid amount, and α = the estimated constant.
Hence, welfare estimates as a compensating surplus (WTP in this case) can be derived from the Eq. (6) and given by:
1
CS = WTP = (V1 − V0) (9)
βT

Where βT = the marginal utility estimate of money/cash if the bid is described in monetary payment vehicle or marginal utility of
labour time if the bid is presented in labour man-days.

3.4. Empirical model specification

The cumulative distribution function (cdf) specified above in Eq. (5) provides the underlying structural model for estimating the
number of econometric models from the binary discrete choice responses (Jaung et al., 2016). Both logit and probit models are usually
applied to analyze the discrete choice data, depending on the assumed distribution of the difference in the error term. If the distribution
of the difference in the error term is assumed to be a logistic distribution, the logit model is used, whereas the probit model is applicable
if a normal distribution of the difference in the error term is assumed. The application of the logit model is mostly for single-bounded
dichotomous choice (SBDC) CV survey data. However, literature recommends the use of the DBDC format for its statistical efficiency
gain (Hanemann et al., 1991). In DBDC, the respondent is asked for a second bid offer contingent on his/her first response, and the
follow-up question provides more efficient value estimations than SBDC elicitation. Following this, the DBDC format was used to
jointly model two households’ discrete responses to the first and second bids in this study, assuming the normal distribution of the
difference in error terms (Tilahun et al., 2015).
The DBDC data can be analyzed using the usually employed econometric models such as probit, bivariate probit, random effects
probit, and interval data models (Abdullah and Jeanty, 2011). The application of the interval data method is dependent on the
assumption that the underlying WTP for the first and second bids is identical. However, Cameron and Quiggin (1994) argued against
the validity of this assumption. Thus, they proposed the bivariate probit method, in which they assume that respondent refers to two
different WTPs when answering DBDC questions. In this case, the argument is that, as the second bid to be offered is dependent on the
response to the first bid, assuming identical underlying WTP is inappropriate. Consequently, they proposed a SBDC-based model that
treats DBDC as two SBDC equations with correlation errors. Following this argument, this study used a bivariate probit model to
analyze DBDC data.
A normal probability density function of a bivariate is among the most familiar bivariate distributions commonly used by statis­
ticians, as it allows for a non-zero correlation, while this does not hold true for the standard logistic distribution (Werner, 1999;
Cameron and Quiggin, 1994). Thus, the nonlinear bivariate probit model was used to identify determinants of households’ WTP and
estimate the values of a binary dependent variable, the “Yes” and “No” answers to WTP questions. Based on Haab and McConnell
(2002), the double-bounded data econometric model can be written as:

WTPij = μi + εij (10)

th
Where WTPij represents the j respondent’s unobserved true willingness to pay and i = 1, 2 are responses to first and follow-up
(second) bid prices, respectively. μ1, μ2 = the mean of the 1st and the 2nd responses, and εij = unobservable random component.
Assuming that µi depends on respondents’ characteristics Xi such that: µ = βXi, the bivariate normal distribution estimated by this
model can be presented as follows:

Y*1j = βiXi + ε1j (11a)

Y*2j = βiXi + ε2j (11b)

Where the covariance between the error terms is represented by the correlation coefficient ρ (corr [ε1j, ε2j] = ρ). Y*1j and Y*2j are
latent variables representing respondents’ unobserved true willingness to pay when the respective bids are offered consecutively.
Where Xi denotes the vector of transposed covariates (i.e., explanatory variables or determinants of WTP), and βi is the corresponding
vector of coefficients in the first and second bids. The binary variable representing this latent variable will be equivalent to 1 (that is, if
the respondent responds ‘yes’), and this will happen only if the value of this latent variable is greater or equal to the respective bids.

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

Hence, the related and observed binary variable of the dichotomous question response representing the latent variables can be
expressed as:
{
1, if Yj∗ > 0
Yj = (12)
0, if Yj∗ ≤ 0

The jth contribution to the likelihood functions in Eq. (10) that can be estimated by a maximum likelihood technique becomes;.

lj (µ/t) = Pr (μ1 + ε1j ≥ t1, μ2 + ε2j < t2) YN

* Pr (μ1 + ε1j ≥ t1, μ2 + ε2j > t2) YY

* Pr (μ1 + ε1j < t1, μ2 + ε2j < t2) NN

(13)

* Pr (μ1 + ε1j < t1, μ2 + ε2j ≥ t2) NY

Where; μ = Mean value for willingness to pay.

t1 = first bid price, t2 = second bid price, YN= 1 for yes-no answer, 0 otherwise;.
YY= 1 for yes-yes answer, 0 otherwise, NN= 1 for no-no answer, 0 otherwise;.
NY= 1 for no-yes answer, 0 otherwise.
By assuming that error terms have standard normal distributions with a mean ‘0’ and respective variances of σ1 and σ2, then the
unobserved willingness to pay values WTP1j and WTP2j will have a bivariate normal distribution with a mean µ1 and µ2; variances σ1
and σ2 and a correlation coefficient ρ. The parameter estimated from the corresponding normally distributed function is denoted as a
bivariate probit model. Hence, the jth contribution to the bivariate probit likelihood function can be formulated as:

L (µ/t) = Φ ε1ε2 (d1j (t1−σ1u1 ) d2j (t2−σ2u2), d1jd2jρ (14)

Where; Φε1ε2 = the bivariate normal cumulative distribution function with zero means.
d1j = 2y1j − 1, and d2j = 2y2j − 1.
y1j equal to 1 if the answer to the first question is ‘Yes’, and 0 otherwise.
y2j equal to 1 if the answer to the second question is ‘Yes’, and 0 otherwise.
‘ρ’ denotes a correlation coefficient, whereas ‘σ’ represents the standard deviation of the error term.
The estimation of the mean WTP for the proposed forest conservation program is one of the specified objectives of the present
study. The mean WTP value estimates with 95 % confidence interval construction were computed using Krinsky and Robb (1986)
procedure of a user-developed ‘wtpcikr’7 command (Jeanty, 2007).

3.5. Definition of variables and hypotheses

Respondents’ willingness to pay (WTP) is used as the dependent variable of the models employed in this study. Therefore, WTP is
categorized as willingness to pay in money (WTPM) and willingness to contribute labour (WTCL) for the proposed conservation of the
forest. These are dummy variables that take the value of ‘1’ for the households that are willing to contribute to the offered bids and ‘0’
otherwise. Besides, previous CV studies on the research theme indicated that WTP is determined by a multitude of predictor variables.
These variables are related to households’ socioeconomic and demographic variables, and infrastructural and institutional effec­
tiveness variables (Mekonnen, 2000; Tilahun et al., 2015; Solikin, 2017; Bakaki and Thomas, 2016; Iranah et al., 2018; Gordillo et al.,
2019; Kassahun and Taw, 2022). Based on the relevant previous studies and prior knowledge of the forest and the population of
interest, the following variables have been hypothesized to be dependent variables to influence households’ WTP for the proposed
conservation program (Table 3). Table 3 presents a summary of the dependent variables and hypothesized independent variables that
affect households’ WTP for both money and labour time biddings.

4. Results

4.1. Descriptive analysis results

4.1.1. Protest responses and willingness to pay for conservation of Belete-Gera forest
Before using CV survey data for further statistical analysis, it is crucial to calibrate the questionnaire data. This involves rearranging
the data by dropping protest responses and adjusting the WTP responses for certainty and consistency. However, excluding protest
responses could lead to higher WTP (Frey and Pirscher, 2019) and should be treated with caution. For instance, Labao et al. (2008)
indicate that in a CV survey, respondent’s reasons for not WTP that are not due to financial constraints or the resource being valued
having no benefit to the respondent are considered protest responses. In this study, respondents are initially asked general WTP
questions without offering any bid amount to identify their willingness to participate in the proposed conservation program. Hence,
respondents who answered ‘No’ to the general WTP questions, in which they are not willing to contribute any amount of money or

7
The ‘wtpcikr’ command is developed by (Jeanty, 2007) to feature mean and median WTP estimated from contingent valuation models.

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

Table 3
Variables’ definitions, hypotheses and their summary statistics.
Variables Descriptions Mean Expected
(Std. Dev.) sign

Dependent WTPM: = 1 if household is willing to pay in money (WTPM), 0 = otherwise 0.96(0.19)

variables
WTCL: = 1 if household is willing to contribute in labour (WTCL), 0 = otherwise 0.92(0.28)
Explanatory Variables WTP
Gender Gender of household head: = 1 if male, 0 = female 0.75(0.44) +
Age Age of household head in years 43.67(14.04) ±
Education level Education levels of the household head in years of schooling 6.11(3.48) +
Distance Distance of the respondents’ residence from the forest areas measured in minutes of time takes to 22.88(15.58) –
reach the forest area
Income Annual income of household in ETB 28971.40 (17331.08) +
Family size Number of family member in the household 6.13(2.16) ±
Dependency ratio Ratio of economically dependent household members to active members within the family 1.21(0.73) –
BID1Money First bid amount randomly offered to each household in ETB per year 127.93(56.68) –
BID1Labour First bid amount randomly offered to each household in man-days per year 45.31(28.27)
Land size Total land holding size in hectare (ha) 1.21(0.74) +
Training Training taken on natural resource conservation: = 1 if access to training and 0 = otherwise 0.59(0.49) +
Credit Credit use: = 1 if respondent use credit and 0 = otherwise 0.45(0.50) +
Livestock Total livestock ownership in tropical livestock unit (TLU) 2.43(2.11) +
Forest status Respondents’ perceived current forest status: 2.10(0.72) +
=1 if perceived ‘Good condition’ & 0 = otherwise,
=2 if perceived ‘Deteriorating’ & 0 = otherwise, and
=3 if perceived ‘No change’ & 0 = otherwise

Source: Authors’ hypotheses (2021)

labour time for the proposed program were asked follow-up questions to state their reasons for the zero bid in both biddings.
Table 4 presents non-willing respondents’ reasons for not keen to contribute both money and labour to the proposed conservation
program. For WTP in money, out of 10 non-willing (zero bidder) respondents, 7 (70 %) households reported that they “could not afford
to pay for the proposed conservation program” (Table 4). These are true or valid zero bidders and are not considered protest responses
because they showed their willingness to pay even though budget constraints hindered them from contributing. Besides, 2 (20 %)
replied that “the government has to pay for such activities”, and 1 (10 %) reported that “have no trust in the proposed conservation
practices” (Table 4). Thus, following Labao et al. (2008), these types of responses are treated as protest responses and excluded from
the statistical analysis. For willingness to contribute in labour (WTCL) case, out of the total 19 respondents who rejected the general
WTCL question, 16 (84.21 %) households stated that they “have no time to participate in the planned conservation practice”, whereas
2 respondents stated that they “do not want to participate or work in the planned forest conservation program”, and one (1) respondent
reported that “the government has to hire guards and protect the forest”.
In general, depending on the above responses, two (2) respondents (i.e. one respondent in each willingness to pay in money
(WTPM) and WTCL, and one respondent for both WTPM and WTCL in common); a total of three (3) responses were treated as protest
responses, and excluded from the statistical analysis. Accordingly, out of the 196 households sampled, only 193 provided valid re­
sponses and were included in the statistical analysis of this study after adjustment for uncertainty and protest responses.
Following the general willingness to pay questions, each of the sampled household was asked to contribute either in monetary
payment or labour time contribution or in both biddings during the data collection survey. This is done to identify their preferences or
choices for appropriate payment vehicles through which they are willing to contribute resources for the proposed conservation
program, as per related previous studies (Kamuanga et al., 2001; Hung et al., 2007). The results from the sampled households show
that majority of the households agreed to contribute in both biddings for the conservation of Belete-Gera forest. As presented in

Table 4
Reasons for not willing to contribute in money and labour time for forest conservation.
Reasons for not WTP Money Frequency Percent (%)

I could not afford to pay for the proposed conservation program 7 70

The government has to pay for such activities 2 20
I do not trust the proposed conservation program 1 10
Total 10 100
Reasons for not WTC Labour
I have no time to participate in the planned conservation practice 16 84.21
I do not want to participate or work in the planned forest conservation program 2 10.53
Othersa 1 5.26
Total 19 100

Source: Authors’ survey data result (2021)

a
Other reasons were specified by respondents in identifying their reasons for not willing to contribute labour as “the government has to hire guards
and protect the forest”.

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Table 5, out of the total valid responses, a larger proportion, 96.37 % (N = 186), of the respondents reported to pay in the monetary
payment vehicle. Whereas 91.71 % (N = 177) of the households preferred to contribute labour time. About 88.08 % (N = 170) of the
respondents were willing to contribute both money and labour time jointly.
Besides, 3.63 % (N = 7) reported that they were not willing to pay in money, whereas 8.29 % (N = 16) were not willing to
contribute in labour (Table 5). On the other hand, respondents were asked questions about their choice of a means of payment through
which the reported monetary contribution will be made. From the total households who have preferred to pay money (N = 186), about
48.92 % (N = 91) of households have favored paying the stated fee in the form of land tax, whereas 51.08 % (N = 95) have preferred to
pay through voluntary donation payment.

4.2. Econometric data analysis results

This study used both probit model and bivariate probit (seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model) for the econometric data
analysis. The econometric models used here are based on the econometric theory and specifications developed in the methodology
sections. Both the single-bounded (SB) and double-bounded (DB) models were estimated to model the true willingness to pay from the
dichotomous choice (DC) CV survey. Before using the data for further econometric data analysis, a test of multicollinearity was done to
check whether multicollinearity was a problem or not for this study. Variance Inflation Factors (VIFs) were used to test the presence of
multicollinearity problems among continuous variables, while the contingency coefficient was computed for dummy/categorical
explanatory variables. High VIFs (if the value is greater than or equal to 10) indicate an increase in the variances of coefficients due to
collinearity among explanatory variables (Gujarati, 2003). The results demonstrate that VIF for all covariates are less than two,
reflecting that multicollinearity is not a problem in this study. Similarly, results from the computation of contingency coefficient
approach to zero, implying low degree of association between the variables. Therefore, all of the hypothesized explanatory variables
were incorporated into the regression analysis.

4.2.1. Dichotomous choice models results

Responses to first bids in both Willingness to Pay Money (WTPM1) and Willingness to Contribute Labour (WTCL1) bidding were
analyzed separately using a probit model. For a separate analysis of the responses to the first and second bids, it is assumed that there is
no correlation between the responses; the correlation coefficient, ρ = 0. Hence, the parameters estimated from a single bounded probit
model were used to compare the outputs with the results from a bivariate probit model for the assumed efficiency gains from DBDC
contingent valuation in the literature (Hanemann et al., 1991). The result from the probit model for the two biddings is presented in
Table 6 below. Besides, a bivariate probit model is employed to model the double-bounded dichotomous contingent valuation format
in a parametric estimation of mean WTP and to identify determinants for both WTPM and WTCL biddings.

4.2.2. Determinants of households’ willingness to pay

This study used bivariate probit regression model analysis to identify factors affecting WTP for BID1 and BID2 for both money and
labour time modes of payment. The application of the bivariate probit model is based on the assumption that the error terms of the
responses to the first bid question and the second follow-up bid question are correlated (Cameron and Quiggin, 1994). Moreover, the
estimation of the model was done based on the theoretical model that has already been discussed in the preceding methodology section
(Section 3.4). Results from the bivariate probit models for both WTPM and WTCL equations are presented in Table 7. The results
indicate that the error terms (ρ) of regression equations ‘1 and 2’ (WTPM1 and WTPM2) are correlated (Table 7). Thus, correlation
coefficients (ρ) between error terms of the two regression equations are statistically significant and considerably different from zero at
1 % probability level. The value of ‘ρ’ less than one (1) implies that the correlation between the two regression equations’ error terms is
not perfect, and the negative sign indicates the existence of a converse correlation between the two.
As presented in Table 7, the Wald test of independence of ρ (ρ = 0, chi2 (1) = 7.695, Prob >chi2 = 0.0055) indicates the null
hypothesis, which states “the error terms of the two regression equations are zero”, (i.e., “there is no correlation between error terms of
the two equations”), can be rejected. This further justifies that the bivariate probit model can be employed and is more appropriate
than the independent probit model estimation for this data. This also holds true for the WTCL model case, where the Wald test of
independence is (ρ = 0, chi2 (1) = 9.343, Prob >chi2 = 0.0022) (Table 7). Thus, the use of the bivariate probit model in the present
study is appropriate.
To test for a null hypothesis that states “all coefficients of the explanatory variables included in the model are zero across the WTP
models”, both the Wald test and the likelihood ratio (LR) test were used. To compare the differences between nested models, the LR test
and Wald test are frequently used. Hence, the Wald test result indicates that the overall bivariate probit model fits the data well enough
that it is statistically significant (Wald chi2 (28) = 104.83, Prob >chi2 = 0.0000, and Wald chi2 (28) = 108.74, Prob >chi2 = 0.0000)
for WTP money and WTC labour respectively (Table 7). This suggests that the joint null hypotheses that the coefficients of all
explanatory variables included in the bivariate probit models were equal to zero have to be rejected for both the WTPM and WTCL
cases.
Alternatively, the likelihood ratio test8 for the overall significance of the coefficients for the independent variables in bivariate
probit models for money/cash and labour WTP models are determined using the formula: G = − 2[ln (H0) − ln (H1)]. Where H1 is the

8
Besides, Akaike’s information criterion-AIC and Bayesian information criterion-BIC values are smaller for the unrestricted models, which implies
that the unrestricted models better fit the data for both money and labour bidding cases.

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Table 5
Payment vehicle preference distribution between willinga and non-willing respondents.
Mode of contribution Willing (Yes) Non-willing (No) Total
(bidding)
N % N % N %

WTPM 186 96.37 7 3.63 193 100

WTCL 177 91.71 16 8.29 193 100
Both WTPM and WTCL 170 88.08 23 11.92 193 100

N = Numbers
a
Willing refers to respondents who have accepted (answered ‘Yes’) to the ‘general WTP questions’, whereas non-willing is used to refer to
households who have rejected or answered ‘No’ to the general WTP questions for both money and labour biddings. The general WTP question,
without offering any bid amount, is initially provided to the respondents to identify whether they are willing to participate in the proposed con­
servation program or not.

Table 6
Probit model result for both WTP money and WTC labour biddings.
Variables WTPM1 WTCL1

Coef. Robust P>z Coef. Robust P>z

Std. Err. Std. Err.

Age of household head 0.0180* 0.0102 0.077 –0.0026 0.0081 0.749

Gender of household head 0.5566** 0.2781 0.045 0.7827*** 0.2567 0.002
Education level 0.1084*** 0.0402 0.007 -0.0063 0.0350 0.857
Family Size 0.0013 0.0566 0.981 0.0499 0.0484 0.303
Dependency ratio 0.1252 0.1732 0.470 0.0588 0.1482 0.692
Distance from the forest –0.0034 0.0082 0.679 –0.0252** 0.0099 0.011
Land holding size –0.1160 0.1934 0.549 -0.0665 0.1738 0.702
Livestock –0.0724 0.0575 0.208 0.0451 0.0666 0.498
Income (annual) 2.63e-05*** 7.96e-06 0.001 8.52e-08 7.90e-06 0.991
Credit Use –0.2207 0.2349 0.347 0.0081 0.2115 0.969
Forest Status
Good condition 0.1078 0.3129 0.731 0.1228 0.3085 0.691
Deteriorating –0.0774 0.2520 0.759 0.2157 0.2465 0.382
Training Access 0.3227 0.2516 0.200 –0.1088 0.2291 0.635
BID1Money/BID Labour –0.0130*** 0.0022 0.000 –0.0193*** 0.0043 0.000
_cons –0.5847 0.7528 0.437 0.6192 0.5871 0.292

Note: ***, ** and * show significance level at 1 %, 5 % and 10 %, respectively.

Source: Authors’ survey data analysis (2021)

log-likelihood of the unrestricted model and H0 is the log-likelihood of the restricted model. Hence, the null hypothesis, which states
“all the slope coefficients in the model are zero” across the two WTP equations (i.e., Eqs. 1 and 2), was assessed through the likelihood
ratio test. The LR ratio test for the null hypothesis results is statistically significant at 1 % probability level, suggesting that the H0 has to
be rejected (LR chi2 (28) = 218.53; Prob >chi2 = 0.0000 for the WTPM model, and LR chi2 (28) = 162.48; Prob >chi2 = 0.000 for the
WTCL model case). These suggest that the unrestricted models (models with all independent or explanatory variables included) fit
significantly better than the restricted models (models without predictors) for both money/cash and labour bidding cases.
The result from bivariate probit model estimation shows that out of thirteen explanatory variables hypothesized to affect house­
holds’ WTP, six variables; age, gender of household head, education level, income, training, and initial and second bids money offered
are statistically significant at 1 %, 5 %, and 10 % probability levels for WTPM bidding (Table 7). For the case of WTCL equations, six
explanatory variables; gender of household head, distance, dependency ratio, land owned, training on natural resource conservation,
and initial and second bids offered in labour are statistically significant at 1 %, 5 %, and 10 % probability levels. Marginal effects for
statistically significant variables of both money/cash and labour models are presented in the next section (Section 4.2.3).

4.2.3. Estimation of marginal effects

The coefficients of a bivariate probit model do not indicate a marginal effect of a covariate on the dependent variable. Instead, only
the signs (not the magnitudes) of the coefficients of explanatory variables are used to indicate the direction of these explanatory
variables on WTP in the case of a bivariate probit model. Hence, partial derivatives of explanatory variables with regard to discrete
responses have to be used to analyze the effects of each independent variable on the probability that respondents accept or reject the
bid offered (Green, 1991). The interpretation of the marginal effects measures changes in the probability of an event to a unit change in
the continuous explanatory variables and a change of dummy variables from 0 to 1 for a discrete response. The joint marginal effects
from the estimation results of the bivariate probit model are presented in Table 8 for both WTPM and WTCL.
The age of respondents has a positive effect on their willingness to pay money, as expected, and is statistically significant at 10 % for
the first bid willingness to pay money (WTPM1) equation (Table 7). However, for the WTCL equations model case, the coefficient of
age is negative, though it is statistically insignificant. The joint marginal effect result shows that as age increases by one year, the

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 D. Abdeta et al.
Table 7
Results of bivariate probit models for both WTPM and WTCL equations.
Explanatory Variables WTPM WTCL

WTPM1 WTPM2 WTCL1 WTCL2

Coef. Robust P>z Coef. Robust P>z Coef. Robust P>z Coef. Robust P>z
Std. Err Std. Err Std. Err Std. Err

Age 0.018* 0.010 0.062 0.000 0.010 0.961 –0.002 0.008 0.769 –0.006 0.008 0.437
Gender 0.547* 0.282 0.052 –0.489 0.353 0.166 0.770*** 0.257 0.003 0.005 0.241 0.983
Education 0.103*** 0.040 0.010 0.104** 0.044 0.019 –0.011 0.035 0.751 0.047 0.034 0.169
Family Size –0.005 0.054 0.930 –0.030 0.058 0.612 0.043 0.045 0.337 0.031 0.055 0.568
Dependency ratio 0.120 0.171 0.483 0.026 0.181 0.887 0.069 0.146 0.634 –0.407*** 0.158 0.010
Distance –0.005 0.008 0.557 0.007 0.008 0.397 –0.024** 0.010 0.013 –0.011 0.008 0.164
Land –0.127 0.200 0.525 0.127 0.237 0.592 –0.106 0.174 0.540 0.274* 0.164 0.095
Livestock –0.068 0.053 0.204 –0.051 0.055 0.351 0.037 0.064 0.557 –0.071 0.053 0.187
Income 2.54e-05*** 0.000 0.002 4.74e-05*** 0.000 0.000 1.63e-06 0.000 0.828 –5.97E-06 0.000 0.425
Credit Use –0.179 0.231 0.437 0.215 0.260 0.407 –0.011 0.214 0.960 –0.025 0.225 0.910
12

Forest Status
Good Condition 0.177 0.299 0.553 –0.272 0.340 0.424 0.061 0.305 0.842 0.491 0.308 0.111
Deteriorating -0.082 0.252 0.745 –0.040 0.317 0.899 0.178 0.243 0.463 0.031 0.243 0.898
Training 0.365 0.245 0.135 0.679** 0.273 0.013 –0.114 0.230 0.622 0.608*** 0.233 0.009
BID1/2Money –0.012*** 0.002 0.000 –0.013*** 0.003 0.000
BID1/2Labour –0.020*** 0.004 0.000 –0.015** 0.006 0.011
_cons –0.712 0.745 0.339 0.419 0.629 0.506 0.759 0.608 0.212 0.756 0.654 0.248
/athrho –0.776*** (0.280) 0.006 –0.664*** (0.217) 0.002
rho(ρ) –0.65(0.161) –0.581(0.144)
Number of obs = 193 Number of obs = 193
Wald chi2(28) = 104.83 Wald chi2(28) = 108.74

Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

Log pseudo likelihood = − 137.55 Log pseudo likelihood = − 179.83
Prob > chi2 = 0.0000 Prob >chi2 = 0.0000
Wald test of rho = 0: chi2(1) = 7.695 Wald test of rho = 0: chi2(1) = 9.343
Prob >chi2 = 0.0055 Prob >chi2 = 0.0022

Note: * ** Significant at p < 1 %, * * significant at p < 5 %, * significant at p < 10 %. The values in parentheses are robust standard errors.
Source: Authors’ survey data analysis result (2021)
D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

probability of households willing to accept the 1st and 2nd bids in money increases by 0.62 %, ceteris paribus (Table 8). The observed
positive impact of respondents’ age on the WTP money for the proposed conservation could be partly due to the fact that older people
have better experience and knowledge about the merits of natural resource conservation. Moreover, older people may consider the
bequest value of the forest ecosystem to preserve for their children in the future, which tends to increase their probability of
contribution relative to the younger respondents.
As expected, the coefficient of the dummy variable gender indicated a positive effect on households’ WTP and was statistically
significant at 10 % and 1 % probability levels for the WTPM1 and WTCL1 models, respectively. However, the marginal effect result is
statistically significant for the WTCL1 model only, showing that being a male-headed household increases the probability of accepting
the first bid by 13.15 % for the WTCL models, ceteris paribus (Table 8). This implies that male-headed households have a higher
probability of accepting the first bid in labour time contribution compared to female respondents. This difference may be explained by
the nature of the proposed work to be contributed; the forest conservation activities, which may be challenging for females, and the
traditional views that restrict women from participating in such outdoor activities.
Households’ education level has a positive influence on WTP in money models, as hypothesized. The coefficient of education is
positive and statistically significant at 1 % and 5 % probability levels for the first equation (WTPM1) and second equation (WTPM2),
respectively. However, the effect of education level is statistically insignificant for the WTCL model. The joint marginal effect result
reveals that on average, a one-year increase in education level increases the probability of accepting the proposed first and second bids
in money by 6.10 %, ceteris paribus (Table 8). This may be linked to the fact that more educated respondents have better knowledge
about the merits and benefits of forest conservation and are more likely to contribute money to the practice.
The coefficient of the distance of households’ homesteads from the forest region indicates negative effects on WTCL and is sta­
tistically significant at a less than 1 % probability level for the initial bid labour contribution (WTCL1), as expected. The joint marginal
effect result for this variable indicates that as the time it takes households to reach the forest area increases by one minute, the
probability of households willing to contribute labour for the projected conservation decreases by 0.69 %, ceteris paribus. This implies
that as respondents’ residence distance from the forest increases, it takes them more minutes to reach the forest area and they are less
able to access the forest benefits. Consequently, this may lead to a decrease in willingness to contribute to desired conservation
activities.
As anticipated, the dependency ratio has a negative influence and is statistically significant at 1 % for the response to the second bid
in labour time contribution (WTCL2). It is a continuous variable expressed in the proportion of household members who are
economically dependent on the active members of the family. The result indicates that households with higher proportions of de­
pendents in the family are less willing to contribute labour for the protection of the forest compared to households with lower pro­
portions of the dependents. The marginal effect coefficient reveals that as the dependency ratio increases by one unit, households’
willingness to accept the second bid offered in labour decreases by 14.77 %, ceteris paribus (see Table 8). This indicates that the higher
the dependency ratio, the less active the family member is, i.e., the lower the labour force available to contribute to the proposed
conservation activities. Additionally, households with a higher number of financially inactive members may prefer to spend their time
doing other works that can provide them with some income rather than contributing free labour to the proposed conservation program.
The coefficient of household annual income shows a positive effect on both WTPM models and is statistically significant at a less
than 1 % probability level. The joint marginal effect estimate for the income variable is very small and reveals that as household annual
income increases by one Birr, the probability of households’ WTP the offered first and second bids will increase by 0.003 %, ceteris
paribus (Table 8). Thus, this value is not different from zero, implying that though households’ annual income is statistically sig­
nificant, it is not significant economically. This further suggests that annual income has no significant economic effect on the re­
spondents’ WTP money decisions for the proposed conservation project in the study area. The finding is in line with the results of prior
related studies where very small marginal effects of income on respondents’ WTP for forest protection were reported (Negewo et al.,
2016).
A coefficient of variable training on natural resource conservation indicated a positive outcome on households’ WTP and was
statistically significant at <5 % and <1 % probability levels for WTPM2 and WTCL2 models, respectively. This finding may be, at least
in part, attributable to the fact that the trained households are more informed and know the value of conserved natural resources,
which creates an incentive to support the proposed conservation effort. The coefficient of estimated joint marginal effect indicates that
household heads who have received training on environmental resource conservation have a 28.39 % and 10.05 % higher probability
of accepting the offered bids in cash and labour time contributions, respectively.
The result from the bivariate probit model reveals that both the initial and second bids in money (Birr) and labour (man-days)
offered negatively and significantly influenced households’ WTP. The coefficients of the initial bid and second bid are significant at a
probability level of < 5 % for WTPM models. While it is significant at < 1 % and < 5 % probability levels for households’ responses to
the initial and second bid offered in labour contribution (WTCL1 and WTCL2), respectively. For WTP money bidding, the joint
marginal effect results reveal that, as the initial bid amount increases by one Birr, the probability of households’ willingness to accept
the proposed first and second bid questions decreases by 0.38 %, ceteris paribus. These findings agree with the economic theory of “the
law of demand”, which implies that the higher the bid price assigned to the respondents, the less likely they are willing to pay the
offered bids for the desired conservation activities.

4.3. Estimation of willingness to pay

Estimation of households’ mean WTP for the proposed conservation program is among the specific objectives of this study. To
achieve the objective, the mean WTP values with 95 % confidence interval construction were computed using the Krinsky and Robb

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Table 8
Joint marginal effects of the bivariate probit models for both WTPM and WTCL.
Variables WTPM WTCL

dy/dx Std. Err. P>z dy/dx Std. Err. P>z

Age 0.0062* 0.0036 0.087 –0.0018 0.0021 0.404

Gendera 0.0699 0.1084 0.519 0.1315*** 0.0428 0.002
Education level 0.0610*** 0.0160 0.000 0.0077 0.0081 0.347
Family Size –0.0092 0.0201 0.647 0.0150 0.0153 0.328
Dependency ratio 0.0462 0.0583 0.428 –0.0710 0.0445 0.111
Distance from forest 0.0002 0.0027 0.941 –0.0069*** 0.0022 0.002
Land –0.0087 0.0757 0.909 0.0362 0.0415 0.384
Livestock –0.0355* 0.0182 0.051 –0.0074 0.0123 0.549
Annual income 0.00003*** 0.0000 0.000 0.0000 0.0000 0.620
Credit usea –0.0039 0.0851 0.964 –0.0073 0.0516 0.887
Good conditiona –0.0178 0.1175 0.879 0.1143 0.0811 0.159
Deterioratinga –0.0376 0.0974 0.700 0.0369 0.0483 0.445
Traininga 0.2839*** 0.0769 0.000 0.1005* 0.0517 0.052
BID1Money –0.0038*** 0.0007 0.000
BID2Money –0.0035 0.0006 0.000
BID1Labour –0.0039*** 0.0009 0.000
BID2Labour –0.0031*** 0.0012 0.009

Note: *** Significant at p < 1 %, ** significant at p < 5 %, * significant at p < 10 % respectively, and
(a)
dy/dx for factor levels is the discrete change from the base level.

(1986) procedure of the user-developed ‘wtpcikr’9 command (Jeanty, 2007). Hence, the mean and median WTP for proposed forest
conservation were estimated from the linear functional form of probit and bivariate probit models, which are presented in Table 9 for
both WTPM and WTCL payments.
As it is possible to see from Table 9, both models are statistically significant. However, the results show that a mean WTP estimated
from DBDC of the bivariate probit model provides the narrowest confidence interval relative to SBDC probit model results in both
WTPM and WTCL biddings. For the WTPM case, the point and interval mean WTP values estimated from the two models diverged, with
a narrower confidence interval around the mean for the bivariate probit model. This implies that mean WTP value estimation with the
bivariate probit model provides an efficient result relative to the SBDC probit model. This further supports the claim that estimation
from the DBDC CV provides improved efficiency relative to the SBDC elicitation method. Thus, the bivariate probit model is selected
and used to estimate the mean WTP for the WTPM case.
The mean amount of annual WTPM from the bivariate probit model is 167.23 Birr10 ($4.88) per household. However, for the WTCL
case, the point and interval values of the mean WTP estimated from the probit model are very close to those of the bivariate probit
model, with a nearly similar confidence interval around the mean, implying that estimation from either of the two models can be
employed in welfare measures. Hence, the annual mean WTCL from the bivariate probit model is 49.66 man-days per household for the
conservation of the Belete-Gera forest over five consecutive years. After the ‘Yes/No’ response to the dichotomous choice questions,
respondents were asked open-ended follow-up questions to state their maximum WTP in money/cash and labour time. Hence, the
mean maximum WTP money/cash from an open-ended format was 112.05 Birr ($3.27) per household per year, whereas households’
annual mean maximum WTCL for the conservation of Belete forest was 32.82 man-days per household for the next five consecutive
years.

4.4. Aggregate WTP for conservation of Belete-Gera forest

To get an estimate of aggregate WTP for management of the forest, the computed mean WTP values from representative sampled
households have to be aggregated across the relevant population (Arrow et al., 1993; Carson and Hanemann, 2005). Accordingly, the
aggregate WTP for the proposed conservation was computed based on the mean WTP values estimated from the double-bounded
dichotomous CV survey data. Following Turner et al. (2004), aggregate mean WTPM and WTCL were computed by multiplying the
mean WTP by the total number of households that had a positive WTP (responded ‘Yes’ to valuation questions) and were projected to
have a valid response in the study area. Hence, the estimated aggregate mean WTPM was 804,050.51 Birr ($23,475.93) per year, while
the aggregated mean WTCL was about 227,214.57 man-days per year for the conservation of Belete-Gera forest. Moreover, the
estimated aggregate maximum mean WTP from the open-ended question format was Birr 538,742.21 ($15,729.70) and 150,164.76
man-days per year for the monetary and labour time bids, respectively.

9
wtpcikr command calculates mean and median WTP, Krinsky and Robb confidence intervals, achieved significance levels, and relative efficiency
measures (Jeanty, 2007).
10
The dollar ($) used in this study is in the US$, and one (1US$) was equivalent to 34.25 Ethiopian Birr at the time of data analysis (December,
2021).

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Table 9
Krinsky and Robb confidence intervals for mean WTP from the linear functional form.
Models WTP Money WTC Labour

Meana WTPM LB UB Mean WTCL LB UB

Probit (SBDC) 143.81 *** 127.62 163.91 49.55 *** 38.74 62.64
Bivariate probit (DBDC) 167.23 *** 154 185.83 49.66 *** 39.02 62.41

LB: Lower bound; UB: Upper bound

Source: Authors’ survey data result (2021)
a
The values of mean and median for a linear functional form are equal due to the symmetrical probability distribution function of probit models.

4.5. Robustness check

To check for robustness of the estimated results from the assumed linear functional form in the preceding Section (4.3), the pa­
rameters were re-estimated by the exponential functional form of the WTP equation, and the required mean and median WTP were
calculated as per presented in the methodology section. The result from the re-estimated parameter of explanatory variables is nearly
identical in sign and significance level with the linear functional form counterpart. The estimated mean and median values of WTP and
95 % CIs for the assumed exponential functional form from the bivariate probit model are presented in Table 10.
The result indicated that the median WTP estimate lies within the confidence interval of the linear functional form counterpart
estimations in Section (4.3) and has a smaller confidence interval. Whereas the exponential functional form’s mean WTP estimate
shows a deviation with a wider confidence interval, especially for the WTCL model case. This infers that the median WTP estimate from
the exponential functional form is consistent and preferable relative to the mean WTP estimates. This further suggests that the esti­
mates might be sensitive to the assumed functional form and hence require careful interpretation and application of the estimated
value.

4.6. Validity test

The welfare estimate using CVM is prone to various biases due to the hypothetical nature of the method. Hence, the validity test of
survey responses is an important component of a contingent valuation study. Thus, we conducted content and construct validity tests
to check whether the estimated results are valid or not. Content validity: The result showed a small rate of protest responses, which was
1.55 % of the total sampled households. This implies the existence of high response rates that resulted from the respondents’ perceived
plausibility of the contingent valuation scenario and the valuation questions used. Hence, this supports the validity of the study’s
design, implementation, and contents. Construct validity: The result revealed that the estimated coefficient for the income variable is
statistically significant and shows a positive sign as expected in influencing households’ WTP money for the proposed conservation
program. Moreover, the model results reveal that the percentages of households who would pay/contribute the offered bid amount (i.
e., responded ‘Yes’ to the offered bids) are not increasing as the bid amount increases for the discrete choice data. These imply some
support for the theoretical construct validity of application of the CVM for this study.

5. Discussions

This study aimed to estimate households’ mean WTP both in money and labour contributions and identifying determinants of WTP
for the conservation and management of the Belete-Gera forest. Hence, in addition to the commonly used monetary payment, this
study included the non-monetary mode of payment, labour time contribution, in WTP elicitation. This study contributes to bridge the
gap in the limitation of labour time contribution as a numeraire in the estimation of the public’s WTP for conservation of environ­
mental resources. The findings show that local communities are willing to contribute resources both in cash and labour (man-days) for
the proposed conservation of Belete-Gera forest in the study area. This section discusses the findings of this study in terms of com­
parison between the employed payment vehicles, comparison with the findings of previous relevant studies, and implications of the
findings for policy design and implementation.

5.1. Comparison of WTP in monetary and labour time contributions

The estimated mean WTCL was converted into monetary values equivalent to make a comparison with the estimated average WTP

Table 10
Krinsky and Robb CIs for Mean and Median WTP values of exponential functional form.
MEASURES WTP Money WTC Labour

WTPM LB UB WTCL LB UB

MEAN 180.00 *** 157.47 238.11 102.94 *** 66.23 324.56

MEDIAN 150.35 *** 137.59 169.33 40.08 *** 33.80 48.05

Note: LB: Lower bound; UB: Upper bound

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

in money values. Several earlier stated preference studies used the market wage rate to convert labour value into equivalent money
(O’Garra, 2009; Vondolia et al., 2014; Rai and Scarborough, 2015; Gibson et al., 2016). Despite its wider application in the literature,
the use of the market wage rate is criticized due to the heterogeneity of labour time values across individual respondents, seasons, and
locations (Czajkowski et al., 2019; Lloyd-Smith et al., 2019). Moreover, Ethiopia does not have a nationally determined market wage
rate, and the minimum wage is available only for public sector workers (Tilahun et al., 2015). In this regard, using the frequently
applied market or reservation wage rate in converting the estimated labour time to monetary values does not account for the het­
erogeneity of time values across the respondents and seasons of the year in which the stated labour contribution is to be performed.
This could, in turn, result in inaccurate WTP value estimates. Thus, the estimated labour contribution was converted into its equivalent
monetary value using a more uniform minimum wage for public workers, which was applied in a previous study (Tilahun et al., 2015).
Besides, the application of the national minimum wage rate ensures a conservative estimation of WTP values, which is strongly
recommended in the stated preference literature.
Hence, a baseline or minimum wage for public workers, which is 1100 birr per month, was used to convert the estimated mean
WTCL into its corresponding monetary values. Accordingly, the equivalent mean monetary value of the estimated mean WTCL from
the dichotomous choice format is 1820.87 birr ($53.16) per household per year. This implies that the monetary value of the estimated
WTCL value is greater than the estimated mean WTPM. This further reveals that the estimated mean monetary value from WTCL is
about 10.89 times higher than the mean WTPM counterpart. Our finding is consistent with previous studies where higher WTP values
for labour contribution were reported (O’Garra, 2009; Tilahun et al., 2015; Hagedoorn et al., 2020). The divergence found between the
two payment vehicles could result from the fact that lower-income households may face a liquidity constraint, which could leave them
with the option to contribute more in labour-time relative to the monetary payment (Vondolia, 2011). Another possible explanation is
that the absence of labour markets reduces the opportunity cost of labour time and the hypothetical bias (Eom and Larson, 2006),
which could lead to households likely to forgo future income by contributing labour rather than the income already owned due to
resource endowment.

5.2. Comparison of the results with relevant prior studies

When compared with the previous CV studies conducted in Ethiopia, the amounts in our findings are within the ranges of average
WTP value estimates in both modes of payment. In particular, Tilahun et al. (2015) reported an annual mean WTP money of $4.86 per
household and an annual mean WTC labour of 7.17 man-days per household in their CV analysis of WTP for frankincense forest
conservation in northern Ethiopia. Amare et al. (2016) reported a mean annual WTP of 32 Birr ($1.66) per household for the protection
and management of church forests. Likewise, Endalew and Wondimagegnhu (2019) estimated an annual mean WTP of 178 Birr and
71.51 man-days per household in cash and labour payment modes, respectively, for church forest management in northwestern
Ethiopia.
The mean WTP in our study also conform with the monetary values reported by other relevant CV studies undertaken in developing
countries. For example, Ariyo et al. (2018) reported a mean WTP value of $0.32 per month per household, which is equal to $3.84 per
year for forest management in Ibadan, Nigeria. A countrywide CV survey study conducted by Gordillo et al. (2019) estimated a
monthly mean WTP of $3.17-$6.28 per household from open-ended and dichotomous choice formats for conservation of forests in
Ecuador. Bamwesigye et al. (2020) also reported that the mean annual WTP for the existence value of forests in the Ugandan case study
was reported to be $15 per household.

5.3. Determinants of WTP and implications for policy design

Our findings reveal that the majority of the explanatory variables showed statistically significant impacts on communities’ WTP in
monetary and labour-time for the proposed forest management. Hence, it is important to consider the determining variables identified
by this study for the effective design and implementation of forest conservation programs. The result suggests gender variations in
households’ preferences for the mode of contribution, where being a male-headed household has a stronger positive effect on
households’ willingness to contribute labour than in money. This implies that male-headed households tend to contribute more labour
time to environmental resource conservation relative to their female-headed counterparts. This might be attributed to the fact that
female-headed households may face labour shortage due to their higher probability of engaging in both productive, reproductive and
routine household activities. Besides, traditional views may restrict women’s participation in such outdoor forest conservation ac­
tivities. The result conforms with the findings of the previous study (Tilahun et al., 2015). Moreover, the fact that female-headed
households tend to contribute less labour time to environmental conservation may suggest the need for introducing labour or time
saving technologies for household activities, such as improved cooking stoves, biogas units, food processors, milk coolers, and others,
which may encourage their participation in such endeavors.
The distance of the homestead from the forest showed negative effects on households’ labour contribution. Thus, the provision of
infrastructure such as accessible roads and transport for distant households to lessen the time it takes to reach the forest area will
encourage their willingness to contribute labour time for the conservation and management of the forest resources. Moreover, it is
proposed that interventions through investment in education, raising public awareness, training, and capacity building in natural
resource conservation are important aspects to enhance and realize the desired conservation efforts. Hence, relevant stakeholders such
as agricultural extension workers and Environment and Forest Authority at the region, zonal, and respective districts need to provide
these services for local communities, which encourages their contributions to sustainable management and conservation of the forests.
The finding of this study also recommends the use of non-monetary payment vehicles (i.e., labour time) in welfare measure of

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environmental resources, which has a crucial role to get a true welfare estimate of the resources under consideration as low-income
households are more willing to contribute labour time relative to money. In general, the strong support and willingness of local
community to contribute resources in money and labour time for the implementation of the proposed policy intervention suggest that
Belete-Gera forest provides multiple benefits to human wellbeing at a local level and possibly at the regional and national levels. These
require government organs, NGOs, private sectors, and other stakeholders to cooperate to mobilize communities and resources for the
conservation and sustainable management of the forests. However, sound justification for such policy intervention could require
further comprehensive research on the total economic value of the Belete-Gera forest resources, including analyzing the opportunity
costs of (not) using the forestland for other competing alternatives.

6. Conclusions

This paper attempted to examine rural households’ preferences and willingness to contribute resources for the proposed Belete-
Gera forest conservation program in southwest Ethiopia. The paper provides an innovative inclusion of a non-monetary payment
vehicle, the labour time contribution, with the application of CVM to elicit public willingness to pay for conservation programs in the
context of developing economies. The findings indicate that local communities highly support the proposed forest conservation
program and are willing to contribute a substantial amount of resources, both in money/cash and labour time. On average, farmers are
WTP 167.23 Birr ($4.88) per household per annum and willing to work for about 49.66 man-days per household per year for the
proposed conservation activities of the forest. The results imply that although Ethiopia is a low-income country, rural households are
willing to contribute significant amounts of resources in the monetary term and labour time for Belete-Gera forest conservation. Our
results further reveal that farmers have a considerable level of understanding about the degradation of the Belete-Gera forest and
recognize the need for intervention to manage and conserve the forest sustainably.
Our result also reveals that the mean WTP estimated in monetary payment is lower than the equivalent monetary value of the
corresponding WTC in labour converted at the minimum wage rate for public workers in Ethiopia. This points out that rural households
are willing to contribute more labour compared to money or cash. Thus, using monetary payment as the only mode of payment in
estimating WTP could understate the desired welfare estimates. This suggests that the inclusion of non-monetary payment vehicles
such as labour time in estimating WTP is a fundamental point to be considered, particularly when applied to low-income countries. The
higher mean value for labour contribution can be partly attributed to households’ income constraints, which may incline them to
contribute more of their available labour time than their limited cash income. Besides, an underdeveloped or limited labour market in
rural areas diminishes the opportunity cost of labour time and may possibly lead to a low valuation of the time, which in turn leads the
households to contribute more labour than the income already owned due to the resource endowment.
Moreover, this study provides useful empirical evidence to understand local communities’ preferences and WTP for the man­
agement of forest resources. As a policy implication, our findings suggest that public financing can be used as a source of alternative
funding generation through the involvement of local communities in sustainable resource conservation programs. In conclusion, while
diversifying the funding source, mobilizing local communities to provide alternative financing for forest conservation can partly solve
the possible budget limitation problem for conservation intervention in the Belete-Gera forest in particular and other similar areas of
intervention in the country in general.

Ethics statement

Before survey data collection, informed consent was obtained from all participants of the study, which includes participating
households, local communities, and respective zonal and district-level Environment, Forest, and Climate Change Offices. In addition,
the study was carried out in accordance with the research ethics and guidelines of Jimma University, and the methods for data
collection were approved by the University’s Department of Graduate Council (DGC) Committee.

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.

Data Availability

Data will be made available on request.

Appendix A. Supporting information

Supplementary data associated with this article can be found in the online version at doi:10.1016/j.gecco.2023.e02551.

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D. Abdeta et al. Global Ecology and Conservation 46 (2023) e02551

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