Online Webinar
Canada
ABSTRACTS
An Economic Valuation of H2Ohio’s Agriculture and Wetlands Program
Glen Delaney, Earth Economic
The H2Ohio initiative is delivering measurable results for Ohio’s people, economy, and environment. The goal of the initiative is to tackle the harmful impacts of excess phosphorus in surface waters, improving water quality through wetland restoration, reducing nutrient runoff, and promoting agricultural best management practices (BMPs), among other programs. The initiative has restored more than 180 wetlands covering 11,000+ acres and enrolled over 3,200 farmers to apply BMPs across 2.2 million acres in 2024 alone, preventing 420,000 pounds of phosphorus from entering waterways. Earth Economics valued the non-market benefits created by H2Ohio’s investment and calculated the ripple effect and job creation of the initiative's spending on wetlands and ag BMPs. Analysis by Earth Economics demonstrates that H2Ohio generates strong returns on investment from H2Ohio’s work restoring wetlands and supporting farmers to reduce nutrient runoff, as the program remediates harmful algal blooms, improves drinking water security, and strengthens local economies.
What are Marshes Worth? Valuing Coastal Community Benefits with SHORE-BET
Donna Bilkovic, Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Marshes are important natural capital assets for many coastal communities, providing a range of ecosystem services such coastal protection and erosion control, nutrient removal, fish habitat, and recreational opportunities. We combined economic valuation techniques with human use and preference surveys, local ecological data, and physical and geospatial modeling to estimate the monetary value and spatial variation in services provided by marsh and living shorelines, within a NOAA habitat focus area in Chesapeake Bay, Virginia, the Middle Peninsula. Our interdisciplinary approach aligns with the site-specific spatial scales of restoration decisions and can be translated to other types of natural capital (e.g., oyster reefs, beaches). This study demonstrated that marsh and living shoreline ecosystem service value is a significant asset for local communities, amounting to about $90M per year in benefits to the Middle Peninsula or ~ 3.3% of the region’s GDP annually. Moreover, insights from an important stakeholder group, recreational fishers, show they place a high value on marshes in the region. Marsh and living shorelines were the most used shoreline habitats by recreational fishers and generate more than 3X the value when compared to armored shores. We developed a decision tool - SHORE-BET: Coastal Community Benefit Tool for Marsh Restoration that calculates the economic value of community benefits to be gained by using living shoreline techniques that restore marshes. This tool helps to account for these ecosystem services so that coastal communities can be better informed when making decisions impacting their environment, economy, and overall quality of life.
BIOS