TOURIST’S WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR DONG VAN GEOPARK MANAGEMENT AND CONSERVATION, VIET NAM PHAM LE VAN KYUSHU UNIVERSITY 2017 TOURIST‟S WILLINGNESS TO PAY FOR DONG VAN GEOPARK MANAGEMENT AND CONSERVATION, VIET NAM By PHAM LE VAN A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Agriculture Economic Supervisor by Prof Mitsuyasu YABE Assoc Prof Yoshifumi TAKAHASHI Assis Prof Goshi SATO Laboratory of Environmental Economics Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics Graduate School of Bioresource and Bioenvironmental Science Kyushu University 2017 ACKNOWLEDEMENT I would like to express my deep gratitude to Prof Mitsuyasu Yabe, Assoc.Prof Yoshifumi Takahashi and Hisako Nomura for your dedicated instructions And thank my lab members so much for interesting academic discussion which helps me to improve my thesis Besides, I would like to thank the management board of Dong Van geopark for providing me secondary data, my colleagues and students of University of Economics & Business Administration for helping me in collecting primary data Last but not least, I would like to send my heartfelt gratitude to my family and my friends who always support and give me spirit motivation to finish my study Thank you very much! i ABSTRACT Ecotourism is nature-based, learning-oriented tourism that has the intent of being environmentally, economically and socio-culturally sustainable The positive impacts of ecotourism include its incentive effect for protecting natural habitats, its provision of funds and volunteer activity to enhance venues, and the stimulation of economic activity in peripheral regions Vietnam has a great potential of ecotourism resources with a large system of national parks and protected areas To develop ecotourism in protected areas in Vietnam, understanding tourist demand is essential in order to ensure supply meet demand Hence, this study analyzes tourists‟ preferences for ecotourism in protected area in Vietnam (the case in Dong Van geopark) to support the decision–makers in ecotourism development process and nature conservation in the protected area in Vietnam This study focus on the analysis of tourists‟ perception and willingness-to-pay for entrance fee in Dong Van geopark Contingent valuation methods is used for the demanding analysis The double-bounded dichotomous definie significant variables which affected the tourists‟ purchasing decision as well as in the willingness-to-pay This paper shows that tourists have positive perception to conserve biodiversity and protect the environment The results of this study show that an entrance fee programme can be designed to improve financial shortfall, protect environment and conserve diversity in Dongvan geopark The majority of the respondents in this study were willing to pay an entrance fee which would goes towards protecting and improving Dong Van Geopark ii LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: Offer price of the double-bounded CVM 24 Table 4.1: Socio-economic characteristics of respondents 30 Table 4.2: Summary of respondents answer for WTP 31 Table 4.3: Summary of explanatory variables 32 Table 4.4: Determinant of visitors‟ WTP for entrance fee 33 LIST OF FIGURES, BOX Figure 2.1: Environmental valuation methods Box 3.1: Bidding price apply for estimating WTP 24 Figure 3.1: Map of study area 29 iii LIST OF ABBREVIATION CM Choice Modelling CE Choice Experiment CV Curriculum Vitae CVM Contingent Valuation Method HPM Hedonic Price Method ITCM Individual Travel Cost Method MPA Marine Protected Areas RM Ringgit Malaysia TCM Travel Cost Method USD United States dollar VND Vietnam Dong WTP Willingness-to-pay ZTCM Zonal Travel Cost Method iv TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background and problem statement 1.2 Objective 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Hypothesis CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Background approaches to environmental valuation 2.2 Past studies using the travel cost method and contigent valuation method in developing countries 13 CHAPTER METHODOLOGY 19 3.1 Research design 19 3.2 Questionaire design 23 3.3 Econometric model 25 3.4 Data collection 26 CHAPTER RESULT AND DISCUSSION 30 4.1 General information 30 4.2 Tourist WTP for entrance fee 31 4.3 Result and discussion 33 CHAPTER CONCLUSION 35 5.1 Conclusion 35 5.2 Policy implication 35 Reference 37 v CHAPTER INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background and problem statement 1.1.1 Background a Concept of Eco-Tourism Ecotourism is derived from the words “Eco” and “Tourism” The word “Eco” comes from Ecosystem, everything surrounding us including living and non-living things “Tourism” means activity done by an individual or a group of individuals, which leads to a motion from a place to another Ecotourism is nature-based, learningoriented tourism that has the intent of being environmentally, economically and socioculturally sustainable The positive impacts of ecotourism include its incentive effect for protecting natural habitats, its provision of funds and volunteer activity to enhance venues, and the stimulation of economic activity in peripheral regions “Ecotourism involves visiting natural areas with the objectives of learning, studying or participating in activities that not bring negative effects to the environment; whilst protecting and empowering the local community socially and economically." (Cristina, 2004) A commonly accepted definition of ecotourism is: “Responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and improves the well-being of local people" Ideally, ecotourism should… - Minimize the negative impacts of tourism - Contribute to conservation efforts - Employ locally and give money back to the community - Educate visitors about the local environment and culture - Cooperate with local people to manage natural areas - Provide a positive experience for both visitor and host b Information on the ecotourism projects in ASEAN countries There are five different ecotourism projects from six different countries namely Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand Evaluating the effective of each project based on the following criteria: - Resources - Local community involvement - Economy - Social and Cultural Awareness - Educational activities - Government support - Accessibility First, Ecotourism project of Cambodia which is called “Chi Phat CommunityBased Ecotourism” focuses mainly on community development and conservation of natural resources The potential resources of Chi Phat are mountains, forest, water, river, Asian Elephant and Tiger Local community can get benefits from ecotourism by providing tour guide, homestay, handicraft, renting facilities, local food, etc Currently local people are being educated on agricultural techniques, environmental awareness and benefits of historical site The site is located around 200km from Capital city, Phnom Penh This site is quite developed already Next, Namguem project from Laos which focuses mainly focuses on natural resources conservation and joyfulness The main resources are forest, mountain, river, island and lake Local people living around the area can get benefits from selling handicraft, local food and fruit plus boat sightseeing tour Moreover, the project aims to raise local people„s awareness on conservation and hydropower dam The site is located just 100km from the capital city, Vientiane This is a popular tourist site already Another project is the ecotourism project from Malaysia which is called Sungei Lepoh which mainly based on the views of waterfall and forest as the resources Local people depend on bamboo, local fruit, wild herbs and guild as the extra source of their daily income It is just 15km away from Kuala Lumpur In our research facilities, however we have limited information Labrador Park which is located just 2km from Singapore city is also quite attractive for its history and coastal area Various flora and fauna can be found in this park But there is low community involvement required for this site China Town in Thailand Ecotourism also shows us many potential points to be promoted to the ecotourism plan The area is very famous for its history, varieties of food and goods and the attractiveness of the place itself The project aims to protect the long history, ancient architectures, local community and the unique identity of this China Town From the information on the above projects, we find that the primary objective of all these projects is conservation 1.1.2 Problem statement In fact, ecotourism not only provides economic benefits for local communities such as increasing local employment and income, but also make tourists “more aware of nature and more supportive of its conservation via changes in their personal behavior, greater political support and larger financial contributions for such conservation” (Tisdell, 2003) In Vietnam, tourists have an interest in the ecotourism and prefer to enjoy all above ecotourism services And tourist‟s marginal willingness to pay for each ecotourism service is quite high The study also reveals that tourists are willing to donate for biodiversity conservation activities in the protected area (Tran et al., 2015) Dong Van geopark was the first global geopark in Viet Nam, the second in Southeast Asia It not only is sculpture product, a historical rocky page of the nature present to human people but also contain a lot of potential values such as, Geoheritages, bilogical diversity, tourism, fossils Especially, the cultural of community 17 ethnic groups on Dong Van karst plateau Geopark, traditional beauty need preserving and promoting Dong Van Karst Plateau is unique combination between Geoheritages and cutural heritages Which has created great potential for tourism and attracted many visitor within and outside country.The Vietnamese government plans to conserve and promote the outstanding convergence of geographic, geological and biodiversity assets of Dong Van karst plateau where , , , are binary-valued indicator variables The double-bounded dichotomous choice model is estimated using log-normal and log-logistic model Where is the probability of saying “yes” T = bid, U and L are the upper and lower limits of the integration, in which , and are estimated parameters, = mean of socioeconomics variables In this study, zero protest bid are screened out and eliminated from empirical model 3.4 Data collection 3.4.1 Research site Dong Van karst plateau has an area of 2.350 square kilometers, spreads over four districts of Ha Giang province: Quan Ba, Yen Minh, Dong Van and Meo Vac at an average height of 1.400 - 1.600 meters with a number of beautiful limestone and winding road Here, scientists have found 33 tectonics heritages, 45 geomorphology heritages and many unique fossils in sedimentary rock, which creates opportunities for the tourist attraction, brings income for indigenous people From Ha Giang town, along 4C Highway about 50 kilometers, tourists step into Quan Ba districts with spectacular and grandeur mountain scenery In the journey to the rocky plateau, visitors can enjoy the beauty of Can Ty Pass Dong Van karst plateau has 80% limestone, is one of the most distinctive karst in Vietnam with black and majestic boulders The shapes of boulders are created by environmental conditions and different stages of development Here, the whole scene is rocks with various shapes such as petals, flowers, flower branch (Khau vai rock garden, Veo Vac District) or the shape of tiger (Lung Cu rock garden) Van Chai rock garden has green grass that creates the majestic and grandeur beauty for landscape Besides the geological value, Dong Van karst plateau also attracts tourists by the unique cultural and spiritual values associated with the ethnic Mong, Dao, Lo Lo… living on the plateau They picked up stones to build house, walls They carved stone to grow corn They renovated the mountainside into a vast of rice The beauty and grandeur of Dong Van plateau comes from not only the huge natural boulders but also the fair of the H‟mong, Dao, Lo Lo… In the morning, ethnic people from neighbor districts come to fair with colorful costumes From the geological unique, in the end of 2010, Dong Van karst plateau was recognized as the first geological park of Vietnam and Geoparks of the world Dong Van karst plateau is one of the special limestone mountain, including the marks of the history of the earth‟s crust process and tradition of indigenous communities Dong Van karst plateau has all elements convergence to become global Geoparks Rocky plateau also has national relic such as: mansion of Vuong family, Lung Cu flag pole, Dong Van ancient, Ma Li Peng pass, Quan Ba Twin Mountain 3.4.2 Data collection The survey is conducted Ha Giang province include: Meo Vac, Dong Van, Yen Minh, Quan Ba Data were collected in two months from August to September 2016 Tourists were interviewed directly to fill the questionnaire with clear explanation about the survey purpose The number of visitors interviewed was 360, and 360 sample are used in this research 28 Figure 3.1: Map of study area 29 CHAPTER RESULT AND DISCUSSION 4.1 General information In this study, 360 successful face - to - face surveys were collection in 2016 After eliminating protest zero and unknown samples, there are 351 sample available for estimating WTP Table 4.1 shows the statistics of socio - economic data Table 4.1: Socio-economic characteristics of respondents Characteristic Mean Age < 34 years ≥ 34 years Gender Male Female Distance < 658 km ≥ 658 km Times < times ≥ times Education < 16 years ≥ 16 years 33.93 Frequency Percentage (%) 203 148 57.83 42.17 223 128 63.53 36.47 198 153 56.41 43.59 313 38 89.17 10.83 36 315 10.26 89.74 0.65 657.99 1.15 15.56 Source: Survey and synthesis calculations Because of randomly interview, so the age of interviewee is different The average age of respondent was about 3s4, in which the majority of respondents are under the age of 34 (57.83%) It can be seen that, tourists who visited to Dong Van geopark are the most of young people because they have health and time In addition, Ha Giang is a new tourist destination Tourists known to Dong Van mainly through the internet (especially Facebook), television, newspapers (106/351 respondents answered) and 30 friends (176/351 respondents answered) Young people will access information from the internet and friends more quickly than older According to the survey, most of interviewees were male (63.53%) We expected that, with male tourists, they are willing to pay for entrance fee more than female tourists In addition, the distance from tourists‟s house to Dong Van geopark will affect to WTP of tourists, because the distance is related to the total cost of the trip Moreover, Dong Van geopark is a new tourist destination, because almost of tourists who visited to this place are the first time Of the 351 tourists were asked, 313(89.17%) tourists were first-time visitors Finally, most of respondents have univesity degrees (over 80% of interviewees) We expected that, visitors who have higher education will pay higher for entrance fee 4.2 Tourist WTP for entrance fee Table 4.2 summarizes the interviewees answer for WTP In which, 150 responds (about 42.74%) have yes - yes answer, it means their WTP are higher than the second higher bid for each bid; and only 17 respond (4.84%) have No-No answer, it means their WTP are lower than the second lower bid for each bid It can be seen that, tourists tend to pay higher at each level of bid This is consistent with the positive awareness and perception of tourists with conserving biodiversity and protecting the environment Table 4.2: Summary of respondents answer for WTP FB Yes-Yes Yes-No No-Yes No-No Total 10,000 49 14 64 20,000 37 59 96 30,000 31 45 10 89 40,000 14 37 53 50,000 19 25 49 Total 150 180 17 351 Source: Survey and synthesis calculations Table 4.3 shows the description, mean and standard deviation of explanatory variables In my model there are seven variables as: Age, gender, occupation, education, distance, times and environment In which, age is the age of respondent in years Gender equal one if the respondents are male and gender is zero if the respondents are female With occupation variable, is one if the respondents are teacher of researcher, is zero if the respondents are other jobs Education is calculated in years of schooling of the interviewees Distance is total kilometers from tourists‟ house to Dong Van geopark Times are the total of times which the visitors come to Dong Van geopark Environment is one if the respondents are interested in protecting environment and conserving diversity, is If the respondents are not interested in environment and diversity Table 4.3: Summary of explanatory variables Explanatory Description variables Age Age of respondent in years Gender Gender (1 = Male; = Female) Occupation Education Distance Times if the respondents are teacher/researcher; if other Years Distance (km) from tourists‟ house to Dong Van geopark The total of times Which the visitors come to Dong Van Mean St.dev 33.931 9.910 0.652 0.476 0.356 0.479 15.564 2.391 657.989 383.912 1.145 0.458 0.963 0.189 if the respondents are interested in Environment protecting environment conserving diversity; If no Source: Survey and synthesis calculations and 4.3 Result and discussion Table 4.4 illustrates the estimation results of double bounded dichotomous Model is tested for all variables and model is tested for only significant variables It can be seen that, all of the significant in model are still significant in model Table 4.4: Determinant of visitors’ WTP for entrance fee Constant and Model (all variables) Model (statistically sign only) Explanatory variables Coefficient Constant Age z-value 9.63 *** -0.03 ** Coefficient z-value 5.13 10.10 *** 5.57 -2.43 -0.03 ** -2.27 0.89 *** 3.35 0.89 *** 3.37 Occupation -1.26 *** -4.64 -1.21 *** -4.53 Education 0.20 *** 4.36 0.22 *** 4.74 *** -2.92 -0.67 *** -2.98 Times 1.26 *** 2.64 1.26 *** 2.64 Environment 0.82 1.62 Gender Distance (logarithm of distance) Bid effect coefficient -0.66 -2.78 *** -14.84 -2.77 *** 14.79 Log Likelihood -423.365 -424.355 Mean 37,360 VND 37,382 VND Median 35,802 VND 35,835 VND Note: ***, **,* indicates significance at 1%, 5%, 10% level, respectively Source: Survey and synthesis calculations Age is negative Young people will pay higher for entrance fee than old ones (Mmopelwa et al., 2007) The reason may be that young people are familiar with to the idea of having to pay entrance fees to natural sites (Reynisdottir et al., 2008) Gender coefficient is positive It means that, if visitors are male, they will pay higher for entrance fee due to our traditional thinking in Vietnam Occupation is statistical significance If interviewees are teacher/researcher, they will pay lower for entrance fee in comparision with others In Vietnam, the salary of teachers/researchers are lower than the same level education jobs Education coefficient is positive It mean that highly educated visitors will pay higher for entrance fee This is consistency with the research from Danso et al (2006) which stated that higher educated people will pay higher fee for environmental protection Distance is significant in model It seems that tourists who lived near Dong Van geopark will pay higher for entrance fee It may be explained that the travel cost of this group is lower than other, hence, they are WTP higher entrance fee Times variable has a meaning in statistic This means that, tourists visit to Dong Van many times, they are willing to pay higher for environmental conservation and biodiversity The frequently visitors may be interested in this site and they are concerning to contribute money to protect this area It may be a reason for positive coefficient of “Times” However, this result is contrast to Reynisdottir et al (2008) The mean WTP of entrance fee is estimated to be 37,382 VND (184 Yen)/ an entrance fee and similarities with median 35,835 VND (176 Yen) CHAPTER CONCLUSION 5.1 Conclusion This study focus on the analysis of tourists‟ perception and willingness-to-pay for entrance fee in Dong Van geopark Contingent valuation methods is used for the demanding analysis The double-bounded dichotomous definie significant variables which affected the tourists‟ purchasing decision as well as in the willingness-to-pay This paper shows that tourists have positive perception to conserve biodiversity and protect the environment The analysis indicates that the socioeconomics variables have statistically significant, only income variable is not significant A number of variables have positive effect on WTP for entrance fee such as: gender, education, times and environment variables Besides there are variables having negative impacts on the WTP of tourists such as: age, occupation and distance variables Tourists declare that they are willing to pay for an entrance fee to protecting environment and conserving biodiversity in Dong Van geopark They are willing to pay 37.4 thousand VND/tourist in average for the entrance fee (estimated by CVM analysis), which is used for conservation activities only Moreover, this study also provides more information about tourist preference for biodiversity conservation The results of this study show that an entrance fee programme can be designed to improve in financial shortfall, protect environment and conserve diversity in Dongvan geopark The majority of the respondents in this study were willing to pay an entrance fee which would goes towards protecting and improving Dong Van Geopark 5.2 Policy implication The research results presents that tourists are interested in ecotourism in Dong Van geopark They are willing to pay for these activities with high price This information is very useful for the managers and especially locals to plan for supplying ecotourism services as well as consider the prices of these services based on WTP results On the other hand, eco-education should be included in ecotourism Information on importance of natural and biodiversity conservation can be provided through ecotourism service Then, the managers can encourage tourists contribute to the conservation of nature and biodiversity in this area The government should implement the entrance fee programme in Dong Van geopark Local community 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Are/are not tourists willing to pay for the entrance fee to conserve Dong Van geopark? If so, how much will they pay? (iii) What are factors affecting tourists‟ decisions willing to pay and the level... visit to Dong Van geopark - To analyze factors which affecting the tourists‟ paying decision 1.3 Research questions The research questions are as follows: (i) Do tourists like to visit Dong Van geopark?