Quantifying Public Preferences in Regional Forest Planning: A Comparison of Decision Theoretic Models

Forest policy decisions are complex and often multi-faceted. A major criticism of the neoclassical approach is the omission of risk and uncertainty, multiple attributes of agricultural and forestry decisions and use of income or profit as the sole metric for evaluation of alternative decisions. This paper evaluates an alternative methodological approach - Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, which can be used to articulate public preferences for forest policy options. The three techniques generated comparable results indicating there is a potential to use such techniques in forest planning and decision making exercises. Notwithstanding the issues of representation and implementation in practical policy settings, the MCDA is well-suited to clarify tradeoffs and to increase transparency in forest policy decisions.