Applying tradable permits to biodiversity conservation: Effects of space-dependent conservation benefits and cost heterogeneity on habitat allocation

This paper is concerned with the cost-effective allocation of habitat for species under spatio-temporally heterogeneous economic development. To address the dynamic dimension of the problem we consider tradable development rights as the instrument of choice. A particular challenge in applying tradable development rights is that the conservation benefit of an individual habitat patch depends on its spatial relationship with other habitat patches and thus is an emergent rather than a fixed property. We analyse with a conceptual model the spatial and temporal dynamics of habitats in a region under a tradable development rights market that takes spatial interaction of habitats explicitly into account. In our analysis two different outcomes may emerge depending on the levels of spatial interaction and cost heterogeneity: an “ordered” structure where habitat patches are clustered in space and are stable over time, and a “disordered” structure where habitat patches are scattered in space and subject to high turnover of destruction and recreation. A high level of spatial interaction or a low level of cost heterogeneity favours an ordered structure while a low level of spatial interaction or a high level of cost heterogeneity favours a disordered structure.     

How Feasible is Carbon Sequestration in Korea? A Study on the Costs of Sequestering Carbon in Forest

In recent years, carbon sequestration has become a more attractive policy in Korea due to the increasing trend of marginal cropland and enhanced public awareness on adverse climate change phenomena. This study aims to calculate the unit costs of carbon sequestration programs through afforestation in Korea and examine the cost-effectiveness of programs. The basis of our simulation is an econometric land use share model, and province level of aggregated panel data are used for model estimation. Four scenarios are considered depending on whether the program includes the harvest and which tree species are planted. The approach of sequestration program is to pay the landowners to convert their lands to forest for a period of time in exchange of fixed annual payment in addition to tree establishment cost. Our results show that the unit cost varies from $122 to $486 per ton of carbon stored depending on the scenarios and payment levels. We found that the carbon sequestration can be a cost-effective mitigation policy in Korea although it is not the least cost option.     

Do Protected Areas Reduce Forest Fragmentation? A Microlandscapes Approach

Conservation policies influence both the amount of habitat loss and patterns of habitat fragmentation. This paper develops a “microlandscapes” approach that combines fragmentation measures with quasi-experimental evaluation methods in order to assess the effects of policy on habitat fragmentation. As an application, the paper estimates whether and to what extent wildlife sanctuaries and national parks in Thailand prevented forest loss and fragmentation. I find that both types of protected areas significantly increased forest cover, average forest patch size and maximum forest patch size. Comparisons between the two types indicate that wildlife sanctuaries were more effective than national parks in terms of protecting forest in the interior versus exterior areas of parks and preventing fragmentation conditional on the level of forest cover. The differences are consistent with predicted differences resulting from spatial patterns of enforcement that are uniform or core-focused in the wildlife sanctuaries versus boundary-focused or include agglomeration penalties in the national parks. Given the greater effectiveness of wildlife sanctuaries in preventing fragmentation and the suggestive link to enforcement types, these results reinforce existing theoretical work urging conservation managers to consider how the spatial distribution of enforcement may affect patterns of resource use.     

Cost-effectiveness analysis of glatiramer acetate in the treatment of relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis

SUMMARY

We have developed an economic model around the patient level data from the pivotal clinical trial for Copaxone® (glatiramer acetate), combined with published cost and natural history data, to demonstrate cost-effectiveness in relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS). Based upon analysis over 8 years, the cost per relapse avoided and cost per disability unit avoided was £11,000 and £8,862 respectively. To facilitate comparison with other therapies and across other disease areas we also calculated the cost per quality adjusted life year (QALY). Dependent upon the assumed utility loss associated with duration of relapse, the cost per QALY ranged between £22,586 and £64,636 over 8 years analysis. Given the nature of the disease and compared to accepted standards of cost-effectiveness in the UK, this analysis shows that glatiramer acetate is demonstrably cost-effective versus best supportive care alone.

Copaxone is a registered trademark of Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Israel     

Cost-effective species conservation in exurban communities: A spatial analysis

Exurban areas have increasingly become zones of conflict as conservation and development compete for the same finite land resources. Conversion of natural areas to land dominated by human use results in loss, degradation, and fragmentation of wildlife habitat which often lead to species endangerment or even extinction. Recently, reserve site selection models have begun to integrate spatial attributes in order to design more compact and connected reserve networks that are thought to improve long-term species persistence. While these models are a good step forward to designing conservation reserve networks, they might not be adequate for use in exurban areas that consist of heterogeneous mosaics of land uses where habitat fragmentation already exists and not all parcels are available for preservation. This paper presents a species conservation framework that expands upon traditional reserve site selection models in three ways. First, because of the focus on exurban areas, the framework used here allows for land conversion within core habitat patches. Second, the framework provides a more robust assessment of connectivity among patches by accounting for land-use heterogeneity in the dispersal matrix. And third, the framework explicitly incorporates species population dynamics. We apply our conservation framework to the case of pond-breeding salamanders in an exurban community in Rhode Island, USA. Comparisons are made between the outcomes for uniform conservation policies and more flexible policies that accommodate ecological and economic heterogeneity. As expected, policies that offer more flexibility in the decision-making process are less costly in terms of foregone development. Conservation planners should consider core habitat patches, dispersal matrix, and spatial scale in their decision making. By not assessing the potential impact of dispersal barriers, reserve site selection models will result in conservation plans that may not protect species over the long term, particularly for species residing in highly fragmented landscapes such as those found in many exurban communities.     

The economic value of INTUITY in aortic valve replacement

Objective: The recent development of the EDWARDS INTUITY Elite? (EIE) valve system enables the rapid deployment of a prosthetic surgical heart valve in an aortic valve replacement (AVR) procedure via both the minimally invasive (MISAVR) and conventional (CAVR) approaches. In order to understand its economic value, this study performed a cost evaluation of the EIE valve system used in a MIS rapid-deployment approach (MIS-RDAVR) vs MISAVR and CAVR, respectively, compared to standard prosthetic aortic valves.

Methods: A simulation model was developed using TreeAge (and validated with MS Excel) to compare the inpatient utilization and complication costs for each treatment arm. Thirty-day clinical end-points for the MIS-RDAVR (mortality and complications) were taken from the TRANSFORM trial; and a best evidence review of the published literature was used for the MISAVR and CAVR approaches. Studies were pooled and parameter estimates were weighted by sample size in order to compare the TRANSFORM patients. Cost data (2016 USD) were taken from the Premier database. Incremental cost and cost-effectiveness was assessed and one-way/probabilistic sensitivity analyses performed to gauge the robustness of the results.

Results: MIS-RDAVR costs $2,621 less than CAVR and had lower mortality rates, making it a superior (dominant) technology relative to CAVR. MIS-RDAVR costs $4,560 more than MISAVR, but was associated with an additional 0.20 life years-per-patient. This implies a cost-effectiveness ratio of $22,903 per-life-year-gained. Thus, MIS-RDAVR is cost-effective compared to MISAVR.

Conclusions: The EIE valve system deployed in a MIS approach appears to be a cost-effective technology compared to MISAVR and CAVR. When compared to CAVR it may achieve cost savings as well. These results suggest that MIS-RDAVR confers superior economic value compared to both standard MISAVR and CAVR via lowered key complication rates (re-operation, renal complications, wound infection, TIA, endocarditis) and utilization (cross-clamp time, hospital ward days).     

贝伐珠单抗治疗转移性结直肠癌的效果与成本研究综述

目的综合回顾有关贝伐珠单抗联合化疗治疗效果及不良反应的Meta分析,及联合化疗对比单一化疗的成本效果分析,探讨贝伐珠单抗联合化疗为转移性结直肠癌患者带来的效果及不良反应及成本效果分析,为贝伐珠单抗在治疗的应用提供一定的参考。方法检索Pubmed、中国期刊全文数据库(CNKI)等发表的对比mCRC患者中贝伐珠单抗联合化疗及单一化疗的Meta分析及成本效果分析。综述Meta分析及成本效果分析的结果。结果纳入的6个Meta分析,显示贝伐珠单抗联合化疗较单一化疗显著提高了患者无进展生存时间、中位总生存期,然而使用贝伐珠单抗可能增加高血压、蛋白尿、出血等风险,而对胃穿孔、血栓等并无显著差异。成本效果分析表明,贝伐珠单抗相较于西妥昔单抗在成本上具有优势,效果相差并不非常显著。结论贝伐珠单抗具有较高成本,然而贝伐珠联合化疗能显著提高患者的生存收益,一定程度上增加不良反应,基于中国本土数据的成本效果分析还需进一步开展。     

Timber harvesting versus forest reserves—producer prices for open-use areas in German beech forests (Fagus sylvatica L.)

A strong demand for nature conservation can be ascertained in Germany. Several nature conservation groups argue that in order to provide nature conservation in considerable parts of the forest area forestry should sacrifice timber harvesting. For example, the abandoning of harvesting altogether is supposed to enhance and protect the species richness. This fact and the very low profitability of forestry in Germany motivated the writing of this paper. The paper explains a methodology for deriving producer prices involved in forest reserves, where harvest benefits are sacrificed totally. Such methodology can be useful to form a basis for private contracts between forest owners and nature conservationists, who demand forest reserves. The results of this methodology can also be integrated in financial programs for species and habitat conservation.In a basic theoretical consideration, it is demonstrated that a stand-by-stand evaluation approach may only serve as an initial step in deriving compensation prices for forest reserves. Due to the stochastic character of forest management, a nonlinear programming approach (NLP) was adopted to find an optimal operational plan for a hypothetical beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) forest. In both the constraints and the objective function, the nonlinearity is considered by integrating stochastic components. Additionally, only virtual homogenous forest reserves are considered. Firstly, a basic NLP solution for the hypothetical forest with the objective “maximise the net present value (NPV) of timber harvests adjusted to risk” was obtained when considering several constraints subject to stochastic variation of net revenues and timber harvests without considering forest reserves. Secondly, other solutions allowing for forest reserves were computed. The decrease of the objective function when forest reserves were increased in periodic increments seemed well suited to mirror the opportunity costs of forest reserves.The results showed that a stand-by-stand approach gave much greater compensation prices than the NLP approach. The reason for this lay in the consideration of a nonlinear objective function as well as the nonlinear constraints in the case of NLP. The first 42-ha forest reserve was priced at 11,494 Euro/ha or, 483 Euro/ha/year expressed in infinite yearly compensation. The yearly compensation price for the last forest reserve had an increase up to 607 Euro/ha/year. A stand-by-stand approach, however, resulted with compensation prices from minimally 609 up to maximally 709 Euro/ha/year.Various interest rates (3.2% and 5.2%) caused different compensation price curves. The slope of the curves increased when the interest rate decreased.The limits of the approach, the problem of deriving a demand for forest reserves and the opportunities for applying the presented approach to state forests are discussed.     

Additionality When REDD Contracts Must be Self-Enforcing

This paper examines self-enforcing contracts as a financial mechanism for reducing carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation when the opportunity cost of the land (i.e., landholder type) is private information and is imperfectly correlated over time (i.e., partially persistent types). Because self-enforcement limits the feasible incentives, the conservation levels are constrained by the surplus created. Regardless of the degree of persistence of such opportunity costs across contracting periods, a first-best self-enforcing contract can deliver “additional” carbon sequestration beyond the business as usual scenario only if the value of forest conservation is sufficiently high. Otherwise, self-enforcing contracts can induce some, suboptimal level of carbon sequestration. The degree of persistence of opportunity costs across periods does not affect the amount of total payments provided in the optimal menu of contracts, but greater persistence of opportunity cost types leads to contracts that feature more of the total payment as a bonus in contracts for landholders with a high opportunity cost for their land and more of the total payment as an upfront fixed payment for landholders with a low opportunity cost.     

Effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of yellow-eyed penguin recovery

Although an estimated US$6 billion is invested annually in our planet's biological diversity, little research has been conducted on which conservation treatments work best or provide best value for money. Where controlled experiments are not possible, econometric techniques can be used to determine the effectiveness of conservation treatments. We use a long-running yellow-eyed penguin (Megadyptes antipodes) nest count in New Zealand to compare the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of three commonly used endangered species recovery treatments—trapping of introduced predators, revegetation, and intensive management. Following ecological theory, we specify a density-dependent population growth rate. We control for year effects and site characteristics such as land cover, slope, and elevation. The possibility of selection bias in treatment is confronted with site fixed effects and with an instrumental variable based on site accessibility. Of the three treatments that we analyze, only intensive management is significantly correlated with increases in annual site-level yellow-eyed penguin population growth rate. We estimate that intensive management increased the yellow-eyed penguin population by 9% above the counterfactual, and that the average cost of producing an additional yellow-eyed penguin nest through intensive management is NZ$68,600.     

成都市中心城区绿色空间格局演变与 道路网络耦合分析

路网密度的提升会导致斑块破碎、栖息地减少等 现象。以成都市中心城区为研究对象,基于遥感影像获取 1995、2005、2015年的绿色空间数据,运用形态学空间 分析等方法明确了绿色空间格局演变特征及划分出绿地斑块 等级,同时针对包含高速公路在内的5种道路类型分别按照 100、500、1 000、2 000m的宽度建立缓冲区,分析出不 同道路类型在不同缓冲区下绿地斑块级别、面积和破碎化指数 的变化情况,总结了绿色空间破碎化与道路网络耦合的图谱关 系。1)土地利用变化以绿色空间面积转化为建设用地为主, 1995—2005年绿地斑块破碎呈穿孔状,2005—2015年进一 步向东北和西南向破碎。2)不同缓冲区范围内斑块级别呈低级 别斑块数量增加、整体面积占比小、高级别斑块数量增加、面 积下降明显的特点,同时绿地斑块面积有减小趋势,高速公路 对斑块面积的影响最大。各道路类型均呈缓冲区宽度越大对斑 块影响越弱的规律。3)1995—2015年,不同道路类型的破碎 化强弱不同,总体上景观结构进一步多样化,斑块破碎化现象 明显加剧,斑块形状呈单一化发展趋势,不同道路类型两侧的 绿地斑块形状复杂程度趋于相同。4)1995—2005年,斑块图 谱类型以零散为主,还包括中空、切割、分散类型;2005— 2015年,斑块图谱类型进一步演化,零散型增加明显。研究 结果能为道路网络规划和生态空间保护提供依据。     

Forecasting the optimal cost of energy conservation by sectors to the year 2000

This paper suggests that government policies to induce or mandate energy conservation across sectors should be based on cost-effective measures. Section 2 outlines the concept of cost-effectiveness by sector according to the marginal cost MC of conservation and the aggregation of the MC curves in a horizontally added aggregate marginal cost curve AMC or the supply curve for conservation. It also outlines a methodology of estimating MC (in constant prices) by regressing total cost of conservation on total energy conserved. Empirical estimation of the MC in the residential sector is attempted in Section 3 by developing data for annualized cost of conservation capital stocks and the related energy savings. The regression of total residential energy conservation costs on total conservation provided the MC at $0.84 per million Btu (MM Btu) to the year 2000. Section 4 used time-series data for the commercial sector and obtained the MC at $0.17/MM Btu for 1980–2000. The MC of conservation in the industrial sector is estimated in Section 5 at $0.78/MM Btu for 1985–2000. In section 6, we estimate the MC in the transportation sector at $2.42/MM Btu for 1980–2000. The last section summarizes the approach and conclusions and recommends that the cost-effectiveness approach dictates that the order of priority for inducing or mandating conservation should be from the commercial to the industrial, to the residential and followed by the transportation sector for the next 20 years.     

Biodiversity value and the optimal location of forest conservation sites in Southern Finland

Safeguarding biodiversity has been one of the most important issues in environmental and forest policies since the 1990s. In Southern Finland, decisions concerning further actions for the preservation of forest biodiversity will be made in the coming years. To support policy making, we present a multi-regional model that is applicable in determining the economically optimal regional allocation of conservation sites. Three habitat quality models are evaluated to calculate habitat quality indices used as a surrogate for a biodiversity value in a forest sector model. The scenarios presented provide information about the economic impacts of conservation choices on the forest sector. The overall economic impacts of conservation depend on its scale and regional allocation. Conserving land with high biodiversity value can have less adverse impact on the forest sector than conservation of typical commercial forest sites. When optimizing conservation set-asides, we found that set-asides targeted to certain regions possessing higher/lower than average relative share of ecologically valuable land, caused lower/higher adverse economic impacts on the forest sector. Because it is expensive to search land suitable for conservation, these regions could be respectively favoured/avoided when asking forest owners to offer their land for the new conservation program in Southern Finland, which will be based on voluntariness.     

Increasing Forest Conservation in Norway: Consequences for Timber and Forest Products Markets

This paper analyses the impacts on timber and forest products markets of increasing forest conservation in Norway. A partial equilibrium forest sector model is applied to analyse effects on roundwood and forest products prices, quantities and trade of four alternative conservation extents. These alternatives are based on a recent biological analysis of the conservation needs in order to protect biodiversity in Norway. Roundwood prices are projected to increase moderately when conservation increases domestically only, since the Norwegian forest industry substitutes imported fibre for domestic. The impacts on roundwood prices are more substantial if also Norways forest products trading partners increase the forest conservation. If forest owners voluntarily conserve forests subject to an economic compensation (which currently is the most likely policy in Norway), the model results imply that forest owners on average are better off with increased conservation. Domestic sawnwood production is projected to reduce when assuming increasing forest conservation, while the production level in the pulp and paper industry is almost unaffected in the short-run. Finally, increasing demand for forest products as a result of environmental good-will may increase roundwood prices and harvest levels in unaffected forest areas significantly.     

Model to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of different antibiotics in the management of acute bacterial exacerbations of chronic bronchitis in Germany

Summary

This study investigated the primary cost-drivers and determinants of the cost-effectiveness of antibacterial treatment of acute bacterial exacerbations of chronic bronchitis (ABECB) in Germany. It assessed the health care costs and consequences related to treatment initiated in the community using macrolides, fluoroquinolones, penicillins, and cephalosporins. Patients were categorised according to disease severity. Decision analysis was used to consider the clinical and economic consequences of various treatment options from first-line treatment initiated by a primary care physician in the community until success or failure after third-line treatment in hospital.

The key cost drivers were the clinical success/failure rates of first-line treatment and the cost per day of hospitalisation. Antibiotics with the cheapest purchase price are not necessarily the most cost-effective first-line treatment. In more severe ABECB, drug acquisition costs are only a small proportion of the total healthcare costs because the extra costs associated with treatment failure are much greater than the acquisition costs of the first-line antibiotics. Thus the most cost-effective first-line treatment is one which results in consistently high clinical effectiveness due to its broad spectrum of activity, low rate of bacterial resistance, and high patient compliance. Of the antibiotics considered, none was consistently found to be the most cost-effective treatment across the full range of scenarios investigated. However, the fluoroquinolones and cephalosporins were generally more cost-effective than the macrolides and penicillins.     

Comparative costs and conservation of wild species in situ, e.g. orangutans

The extent to which conservation is feasible is constrained by budgets and the financial sacrifice stakeholders are willing to bear. Therefore a possible objective for conserving a species is to minimise the cost of achieving that stated aim. For example, if a minimum viable population (MVP) of a species is to be conserved, the size and type of habitats reserved for this could be selected to minimise cost. This requires consideration of the comparative (relative) opportunity costs of reserving different land types for conservation. A general model is developed to demonstrate this and is applied to the case of the orangutan. In the ecological literature, recommendations for reserving different types of land for conservation have been based on comparisons of either the absolute economic returns they generate if converted to commercial use or on differences in the density of a species they support. These approaches are shown to be deficient because they ignore relative trade-offs between species population and economic conversion gains at alternative sites. The proposed model is illustrated for orangutan conservation.     

Seismic Shifts from Regulations: Spatial Trade-offs in Marine Mammals and the Value of Information from Hydrocarbon Seismic Surveying

Seismic surveys can improve estimates of net private benefits from uncertain hydrocarbon deposits. The Value-of-Information (VOI) can capture these gains. At the same time, seismic surveys impose uncertain damages from noise pollution on marine life. Arctic waters are increasingly attractive exploration locales, but ice cover temporally constrains both surveying and marine mammal species. Thus, damage mitigation requires both temporal and spatial planning. We develop a spatially explicit bio-economic model through which we can calculate the VOI from seismic surveying options alongside potential marine mammal displacements. We demonstrate the model using hydrocarbon exploration opportunities off the Western Greenlandic coast. Lacking estimates for marine mammal sound habitat conservation benefits, we use cost-effectiveness (CEA) as an alternative to weakly informed cost–benefit analysis to identify implicit thresholds as a function of regulatory choices based on different relative spatial values of marine mammal habitat conservation. We check robustness using Monte Carlo (MC) simulations. We illustrate how the combined use of VOI, CEA and MC can ease decision making when uncertainties are compounded and cost–benefit analysis is not feasible.

     

Cost-effectiveness of percutaneous closure of a patent foramen ovale compared with medical management in patients with a cryptogenic stroke: from the US payer perspective

Abstract

Aims: To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of percutaneous patent foramen ovale (PFO) closure, from a US payer perspective. Lower rates of recurrent ischemic stroke have been documented following percutaneous PFO closure in properly selected patients. Stroke in patients aged <60?years is particularly interesting because this population is typically at peak economic productivity and vulnerable to prolonged disability.

Materials and methods: A Markov model comprising six health states (Stable after index stroke, Transient ischemic attack, Post-Transient Ischemic Attack, Clinical ischemic stroke, Post-clinical ischemic stroke, and Death) was constructed to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of PFO closure in combination with medical management versus medical management alone. The base-case model employed a 5-year time-horizon, with transition probabilities, clinical inputs, costs, and utility values ascertained from published and national costing sources. Incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) was evaluated per US guidelines, utilizing a discount rate of 3.0%.

Results: At 5?years, overall costs and quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) obtained from PFO closure compared with medical management were $16,323 vs $7,670 and 4.18 vs 3.77, respectively. At 5?years, PFO closure achieved an ICER of $21,049, beneficially lower than the conventional threshold of $50,000. PFO closure reached cost-effectiveness at 2.3?years (ICER = $47,145). Applying discount rates of 0% and 6% had a negligible impact on base-case model findings. Furthermore, PFO closure was 95.4% likely to be cost-effective, with a willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold of $50,000 and a 5-year time horizon.

Limitations: From a cost perspective, our economic model employed a US patient sub-population, so cost data may not extrapolate to other non-US stroke populations.

Conclusion: Percutaneous PFO closure plus medical management represents a cost-effective approach for lowering the risk of recurrent stroke compared with medical management alone.     

Cost-effectiveness of hydrophilic-coated intermittent catheters compared with uncoated catheters in Canada: a public payer perspective

Study design: A Markov model was used to analyze cost-effectiveness over a lifetime horizon.

Objective: To investigate the cost-effectiveness of hydrophilic-coated intermittent catheters (HCICs) compared with uncoated catheters (UCs) among individuals with neurogenic bladder dysfunction (NB) due to spinal cord injury (SCI).

Setting: A Canadian public payer perspective based on data from Ontario; including a scenario analysis from the societal perspective.

Methods: A previously published Markov decision model was modified to compare the lifetime costs and quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) for the two interventions. Three renal function and three urinary tract infection (UTI) health states as well as other catheter-related events were included. Scenario analyses, including utility gain from compact catheter and phthalate free catheter use, were performed. Deterministic and probabilistic sensitivity analyses were conducted to evaluate the robustness of the model.

Results: The model predicted that a 50-year-old patient with SCI would gain an additional 0.72 QALYs if HCICs were used instead of UCs at an incremental cost of $48,016, leading to an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) of $66,634/QALY. Moreover, using HCICs could reduce the lifetime number of UTI events by 11%. From the societal perspective, HCICs cost less than UCs, while providing superior outcomes in terms of QALYs, life years gained (LYG), and UTIs. The cost per QALY further decreased when health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) gains associated with compact HCICs or catheters not containing phthalates were included.

Conclusion: In general, ICERs in the range of CAD$50–100,000 could be considered cost-effective. The ICERs for the base case and sensitivity analyses suggest that HCICs could be cost-effective. From the societal perspective, HCICs were associated with potential cost savings in our model. The results suggest that reimbursement of HCICs should be considered in these settings.     

Economic cost of deforestation in semi-deciduous forests — A case of two forest districts in Ghana

The ecological, economic and socio-cultural roles of forests are under threat in Ghana due to the high rate of deforestation. Efforts are being made to combat this problem through rehabilitation measures. However, the costs of deforestation and restoration benefits are not adequately estimated. This paper fills in the gap in knowledge by providing an empirical estimation of the cost of deforestation in monetary terms. Primary data collected regarding timber, non-timber forest products and soils in semi-deciduous forests were analyzed using opportunity cost and replacement cost techniques. The results emphasize differences in the value of these forest goods and services lost annually. The largest losses were in stumpage fees, edible fruits, and avoided carbon emissions values. The results show that US$133,650,000 gross revenue, equivalent to 2.6% of the 2008 agricultural sector Gross Domestic Product, is lost annually. It can be concluded that restoring the degraded forest lands would bring benefits particularly to the local communities through increased stumpage revenues and harvest of non-timber forest products, as well as additional funds from carbon credits. It is recommended that stakeholders of forest resources are made aware of these costs in order to raise awareness of what they are losing through deforestation.