How Many Benefits Does Commercial Forestry Provide?

by Emil Morhardt

Forestry economists worry about whether foresters can claim more societal benefits, including offsetting the effects of climate change, from forestry than merely the increased supply of trees; in econ-speak, “…what change in human well-being results from increasing, reducing or qualitatively varying…” the supply of ecosystem services commercial forests provide? Colin Price (2014) addresses this question largely in the abstract by providing an overview of eight general approaches to valuing non-market effects, which, although they break little new ground, provide an extremely clear overview of a generally murky subject. Continue reading