3.1. Study Area and Data Collection
The study area covered 16 counties located in the Tennessee portion of the Cumberland Plateau (
Figure 1): Bledsoe, Campbell, Cumberland, Fentress, Franklin, Grundy, Marion, Morgan, Overton, Pickett, Putnam, Scott, Sequatchie, Van Buren, Warren, and White. The Plateau is one of the “largest temperate hardwood plateau systems” and has remained largely undeveloped until recently due to the rugged terrain [
37]. Most of the forests on the Plateau are under private ownership [
38] and forested areas in some counties (e.g., Cumberland) have recently seen a surge of amenity migration and retiree growth. Sustaining the ecosystem and quality of life on the Plateau therefore will require cooperation of thousands of landowners in protecting and efficiently managing forests in the long run. With timber markets struggling in recent years, ES could serve as new markets for the forests.
Figure 1.
16-county area of the Cumberland Plateau of Tennessee.
Figure 1.
16-county area of the Cumberland Plateau of Tennessee.
Data required were collected with a mail survey of randomly selected forest landowners in the study area. The questionnaire was mailed to more than 1700 NIPFs in 2007 following the Total Design Method [
39]. Two hundred and forty-six names were eliminated from the survey results because of the bad addresses, death, or having sold the land. As a consequence, a total of 590 completed surveys were returned, yielding an adjusted return rate of 41%. Survey questions included Likert scale items regarding their level of interest (1 = no interest at all, 4 = high interest) in managing forests for three types of ES: carbon sequestration, water, and aesthetics. Besides, other questions included in this survey were grouped into six different categories (
Table 1): sociodemographic, forest ownership and management objective, attitudes towards incentives, motivation of owning forestlands, future ownership plan, and other factors (perceived risk of damage and return from forest). Besides the survey questions, the secondary data regarding per acre return from forests in the respective county of each respondent was obtained from the
Tennessee Statistical Abstract which was published by the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Tennessee. We divided the total dollar value of agriculture or forest product by the average farm size of the respective type to get the return on a per acre basis [
40].
Table 1.
Explanatory variables used to explain landowners’ interest in managing forests to supply ecosystem services.
Table 1.
Explanatory variables used to explain landowners’ interest in managing forests to supply ecosystem services.
Variable | Description | Mean (S.E.) |
---|
Sociodemographic |
Age | Age of the landowner | 68.99 (12.63) |
Female | Dummy variable, 1 if female, 0 otherwise | 0.23 (0.42) |
Education | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner has more than college education, 0 otherwise | 0.39 (0.49) |
Income | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner has >$75,000 in annual income, 0 otherwise | 0.34 (0.47) |
Occupation | Dummy variable, 1 if white-collar occupation, 0 otherwise | 0.17 (0.38) |
Forest ownership and management objective |
Tenure | Number of years the property has been with landowner’s family | 43.06 (41.92) |
Acquisition | The mode of acquisition of forest by landowners. (1 if purchased, 0 otherwise) | 0.72 (0.45) |
Ownership size | Categorical variable, 1 if the landowner owns <10 acres of forestland, 2 if owns between 10 and 100 acres, and 3 if owns >100 acres | 2.22 (0.49) |
Timber harvesting | Dummy variable, 1 if the landowner recently harvested timber or planning to harvest soon, 0 otherwise | 0.22 (0.41) |
Advice | Dummy variable, 1 if the landowner received advice from professionals, 0 otherwise | 0.04 (0.19) |
Attitudes toward Incentives |
Property tax | Reported usefulness of property tax as incentive (1 = not useful, 5 = extremely useful) | 3.65 (1.27) |
Payment of individuals/companies | Reported usefulness of payment from private individual/company as incentive (1 = not useful, 5 = extremely useful) | 2.85 (1.50) |
Payment of government | Reported usefulness of payments from government as incentive (1 = not useful, 5 = extremely useful) | 3.05 (1.49) |
Motivations of owning forestlands |
Financial investment | Importance placed by landowner on “financial investment” as ownership motivation (1 = not important, 5 = extremely important) | 3.03 (1.36) |
Hunting/fishing | Importance placed by landowner on “hunting and fishing” as ownership motivation (1 = not important, 5 = extremely important) | 2.71 (1.48) |
Farm/Home site | Importance placed by landowner on “farm” as ownership motivation (1 = not important, 5 = extremely important) | 3.53 (1.45) |
Inheritance | Importance placed by landowner on “pass on to heirs” as ownership motivation (1 = not important, 5 = extremely important) | 2.46 (1.67) |
Peacefulness/tranquility | Importance placed by landowner on “peacefulness and tranquility” as ownership motivation (1 = not important, 5 = extremely important) | 3.94 (1.20) |
Future ownership plan |
Inherit | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner plans to pass the forests to heirs, 0 otherwise | 0.76 (0.43) |
Develop | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner continues to manage the forests, 0 otherwise | 0.06 (0.24) |
Sell | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner plans to sell the forests, 0 otherwise | 0.19 (0.40) |
Donate | Dummy variable, 1 if landowner plans to donate the forests to others, 0 otherwise | 0.03 (0.17) |
Other factors |
Perceived risk of damage | Landowner’s perception of risks of environmental damage associated with harvesting timber (1 = no risk at all, 5 = extreme risk) | 3.34 (0.91) |
Return from forest | Land productivity from forest use as measured by per acre value ($) of timber products for landowner’s county | 10.51 (3.87) |
3.2. Empirical Model
Researchers typically have relied on logistic regression to model forest landowner management decisions due to the categorical nature of dependent variable (e.g., harvest or not harvest) [
14,
36,
41,
42,
43,
44]. Since our study also involves modeling the landowner’s level of interest, as measured by a Likert scale, a multivariate logistic regression was used. The dependent variable was the respondents’ level of interest in managing forests to provide a given ES (
i.e., carbon sequestration, water quality, and aesthetic beauty). To examine whether specific factors related to NIPF landowner interest varied with different types of ES, each of the three dependent variables were separately regressed against explanatory variables. In each ES case, the dependent variable was hypothesized to be a function of the independent variables shown in Equation (1).
Mathematically, the multivariate logistic regression model is presented in Equation (2):
where
Y represents the level of respondents’ interest in supplying selected ES,
xk is the matrix for all independent variables and
indicates the associated parameters ε
k is the error term of stochastic (unobserved) variation.
The sociodemographic group consisted of age, gender, education, income, and occupation. With respect to the relationship of age and gender with landowner interest in supplying ES, previous studies revealed that older and female landowners exhibit more interest in non-timber values and are more concerned for the environment [
14,
45,
46]. Therefore, we expected a positive sign between age and landowner interest in providing ES. Moreover, income, education, and white-collar occupations were hypothesized to be positively related with landowner interest in managing forests for provisioning ES.
The second category included tenure, mode of acquisition, ownership size, timber harvesting history, and whether landowners received advice from professionals. Results regarding the relationship between tenure and forest management activities from previous studies are mixed [
47,
48] and therefore it is difficult for them to guide expectations for this study. In terms of mode of acquisition, we hypothesized that purchasers would be more interested in supplying ES than those who inherited forest from their parents. The reason behind this is that those who have invested resources in purchasing the land might be motivated by the potential benefit of incentives from provision of ES. In addition, compared to landowners who receive forestlands through inheritance, landowners who purchase their forestlands might be keener in managing the property with a specific interest. Previous studies also provided mixed results regarding the relationship between landholding size and interest in providing ES. Knoot
et al. [
14] and Jacobson
et al. [
49] concluded that there is no relationship between the land size and attitudes toward ES supply, whereas Thompson
et al. [
17] reported a negative correlation between increasing tract size and landowner interest in carbon sequestration. Hence, it is difficult to speculate on the relationship between landholding size and landowner interest in providing ES here. Nevertheless, we expected a negative relationship between timber harvesting and landowner intentions to supply ES because landowners who harvested or are planning to harvest timber might have less interest in non-timber products. By contrast, a positive sign for the advice variable was expected because landowners who received management advice from professionals were more motivated to manage their forests for ES. The reason is that the professional consulting could help the landowners meet their management objectives.
Attitudes toward incentives (for providing ES) of various types were also included in the model. Three types of incentives were included: payments from government, payments from private individuals/companies, and property tax incentives. Jack
et al. [
30] reported that payment for ES increases the supply of water purification and carbon sequestration. By the same token, a landowner’s favorable view of incentives is expected to be positively related to landowner interest.
Ownership motivation variables included the importance placed on financial investment, hunting/fishing, farm/home site, inheritance, and peacefulness/tranquility for owning the forest. We expected that those placing higher importance on recreation (e.g., hunting/fishing), the site of their farm or home, and tranquility were more likely to manage forests for ES. On the contrary, landowners whose main purpose was to obtain financial benefits from their land would be less interested in ES. Majumdar
et al. [
8] noted that inheritors are more likely to manage forests for both timber and non-timber products than non-inheritors. Hence, we expected landowners who inherited land to exhibit more interest in ES provision.
We also expected that future ownership plans would affect landowner willingness to supply ES. Hence, variables for landowner plans to inherit, develop, sell, and donate were included. Kendra
et al. [
50] and Finley
et al. [
19] reported that “plan to sell” owners are less interested in engaging in forest management. Conversely, landowners who were willing to bequeath the forestlands to future generations are more concerned about both timber and non-timber values [
31]. Thus, we expected that owners who were planning to bequeath the forests to their descendants were more willing to supply ES than those who were planning to sell or donate forestlands.
The final category was composed of two variables: perceived risk of damage by harvesting and financial return from forestland use as measured by the per-acre value of wood products sold. The perceived risk and liability variable was developed by combining landowners’ responses to seven different items characterizing the risk and liabilities that may be associated with the logging of a forest area. Using a 5-point Likert scale (1 = no risk at all, 5 = very high risk), their perception of the level of risk in terms of timber being stolen, property damage, water quality impacts, damage to residual trees, landowner liability, poor utilization of wood and waste, and beauty of the area affected were measured. Individual scores were added and then divided by seven to get the average score of perceived risk and liability. It is reasonable to expect that some landowners may not appreciate the aesthetic damage from timber harvesting [
51]. Hence, the perceived risk of damage associated with timber harvesting can be significantly related to interest in non-timber services. As a result, private owners who perceived high risks from harvesting were expected to be willing to manage forests for non-timber services. Considering the Ricardian land rent theory [
52], we hypothesized that landowners would be less interested in managing forests for ES if the per acre return from wood products (or the timber productivity) is high.