Maintenance of public amenity to improve access to nature area: does distance and expected economic benefits matter?

Advocates of national park are often of the opinion that benefits from ecotourism will compensate people whose livelihoods are affected by conservation policy. This paper reports on a study which explored whether local people consider distance of their homes to a national park and future economic benefits from ecotourism when eliciting their willingness to pay for rural road that could help improve access to the park for ecotourism. The possibilities for designing an ecotourism strategy that benefits people who live around the national park are discussed. The data originated from a contingent valuation survey which involves personal interviews of community members around the Okwangwo Division of the Cross River National Park in south-east Nigeria and were analysed using a two-stage least squares regression model. The results showed that the respondents consider location of the national park and whether they will benefit from businesses related to ecotourism when stating their willingness to pay. The interviewees who live 7.1 to 10 km to the Okwangwo Division had the highest willingness to pay, and those who live not more than 1 km had the lowest. The interviewees who expect to get economic benefits from ecotourism in the future had higher willingness to pay than those who did not expect. The willingness to pay was influenced by distance, expected economic benefits, income, age and gender. The findings will contribute to planning and design of a more acceptable and sustainable ecotourism strategy near nature conservation areas. Copyright The Psychonomic Society Inc. 2014