Farmland prices and land-use changes in periurban protected natural areas

This paper provides empirical and conceptual insights in analysing the factors that determine the prices of farmland within Protected Natural Areas that are close to densely populated urban areas, the changes in land use experiences as well as the additional control policies needed to curb this unsustainable trend.The Urdaibai Biosphere Reserve nearby the metropolitan area of Bilbao (Basque Country, Spain) is the case study considered and its bordering non-protected rural area is used as a reference for comparison. A spatial hedonic farmland price model is estimated and the willingness of land purchasers to pay for different farmland characteristics quantified both inside and outside the Urdaibai Biosphere Reserve. The main results are that: (1) residential development is taking place in all categories of farmland, (2) aside from neighbouring prices, farmland prices depend on different factors depending on whether the marketed plots stand inside or outside the Protected Natural Area, (3) the “reserve effect” on land prices is less powerful than the “proximity to the metropolitan area (and motorway) effect” observed from villages of the non-protected area located in the 3rd crown of Bilbao, (4) the reasons for farmers non-compliance with policy regulations is the necessary knowledge base for the farmland conservation policy design and (5) in the light of the results, three development-control policy instruments such as Payments for Ecosystem Services, Tradable Planning Permits and development-taxes are discussed considering the factors that could improve compliance.     

Sampling method for monitoring the alternative accommodation market

Tourism is an extremely competitive industry where effective destination management is necessary to compete. One of the main destination management stakeholders is the hotel industry. Since the advent of the Internet websites that facilitate the sharing economy, the hotel industry has had to compete with an alternative accommodation market. This alternative market is difficult to monitor as there is no official data. Current research works on developing methods for calculating tourism metrics for a destination based on digital footprint with the objective of offering figures to complement official statistics. The objective of our research is to develop a method to monitor the alternative accommodation market based on data collected from Airbnb. This paper reports the results of the first step: the design of a sampling method for data scraping from this website that provides a representative sample of the accommodation offer of the Basque Country distributed through it and its prices. The results show that the length-of-stay (LOS) parameter of the queries to the website is key to obtaining a representative sample of the accommodation offered through this channel. A sampling method based on the representative values of LOS inferred from a data sample is proposed.     

Is the Current Regulation of the VIII Division European Anchovy Optimal?

This paper sets out to assess the workability of the regulation currently in force in the European anchovy fishery of the VIII division. Particular attention is paid to the importance of the institutional regime in the allocation of natural resources. The study uses a bio-economic approach and takes into account the fact that, not only the European Union and the individual countries involved, but also some of the resource users or appropriators intervene in its management. In order to compare the effectiveness of the rules which, at the various levels, have been set up to restrict exploitation of the resource, the anchovy fishery is simulated in two extreme situations: open access and sole ownership. The results obtained by effective management will then be contrasted with those obtained from the maximum and zero profit objectives related with the two above-mentioned scenarios. Thus, if the real data come close to those derived from the sole ownership model it will have to be acknowledged that the rules at present in force are optimal. If, on the other hand, the situation more closely approach the results obtained from the open access model, we will endeavour in our conclusions to provide suggestions for economic policy measures that might improve the situation in the fishery.     

Bioeconomic diversity dynamics of a marine ecosystem

This paper models the bio-economic diversity dynamics of a marine ecosystem made up by its entire commercial fish species and, from the fitted model, obtains a quantitative measure of its resilience to disturbance in terms of recovery time after a shock. Such shocks might be produced by both, downturns in catches and/or prices related to changing regulatory and environmental conditions. To that end, monthly time series of bio-economic diversity indices will be used and the framework of a mixed cyclical ARFIMA joint with a GARCH type heteroscedaticity model will be explored to analyse the dynamic properties of such indices and, based on the estimated impulse response functions (IRF) to measure the effects and duration of a unitary random shock or disturbance. One of our findings is that bio-economic diversity is a mean-reverting process with an estimated recovery time between 7 and 10 years.     

The Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility in Alfred Marshall's Principles of Economics *

The goal of this paper is to clarify the content of the Marshallian Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility. The paper is divided into seven sections. In the first one, I present the eight formulations of the Law that I record in the Principles and the foundation that Marshall provides for it. In the second and third sections, I present a couple of objections raised by Marshall himself against the universal validity of the Law; in my opinion, his answer to them is not sound. I contrast my interpretation with those of the other authors. In the fourth section, The Law of Utility is distinguised from the Law of Demand. In section five, l present the two meanings in which Marshall employs the term ‘utility’: as pleasure, and as a formal notion. In section six, I attempt to build an explanatory framework for the encountered difficulties. Finally, the seventh section is devoted to conclusions.     

Assessing Changes in Capital and Investment as a Result of Fishing Capacity Limitation Programs

This paper provides a framework to evaluate the effectiveness of the European Multiannual Guidance Programmes on capacity limitation based on the evolution of the prices of used fishing vessels and on the measures of capital and investment derived from the estimation of a hedonic price function related to vessels characteristics. Attention is paid not only to the correct specification of the numerical variables but also, to testing for sample selection bias, to checking for structural change, to analysing the convenience of using alternative estimation methods and to discussing the potential bias as a result of asymmetric information in the used markets. The application of this framework to the Basque fleets evidences clear and coincident signs of successful adjustment after MAGP₃, but also a substantial investment in the next periods as a result of the modernisation of the fleets.