NERP TE Project 12.3 Relative social and economic values of residents and tourists in the WTWHA (JCU)

The Wet Tropics World Heritage Area (WTWHA) is famous for its wildlife, biodiversity and natural beauty, but none of these important assets are bought or sold in the market place, so none are explicitly ¿valued¿ with a price. Recognising that absence of price does not mean absence of value, this project seeks to improve our understanding of the importance of these non-market ¿values¿ to a variety of different stakeholders. How important is a beautiful view or a cassowary to the community, to tourists and to the tourism industry? How would people feel if there fewer (or more) opportunities to enjoy those beautiful views or to observe these charismatic birds?\n\nThe project will provide environmental managers throughout the world with an illustrated, easy to understand, means of assessing the importance of these types of non-market values to a variety of different stakeholder groups in World Heritage listed forests and other scenic environments. \n\nThis project will:\n1. Develop a survey to assess the relative importance of core 'values' of the WTWHA (e.g. cassowaries, mahogany sugar gliders, waterfalls, aesthetics) with other ¿values¿ (e.g. development of roads, employment, or income) so that managers are able to assess trade-offs between core WTWHA attributes and other ¿values¿.\n\n2. Distribute the questionaire to residents (householders) throughout the WTWHA and to tourists at the Cairns airport at different times of the year (to control for seasonality of data) in the form of an exit survey;\n\n3. To analyse the results using multivariate analysis to measure the satisfaction and relative value across different stakeholder groups and to use insights from this analysis to identify priorities for conservation and marketing.

湿热带世界遗产地（Wet Tropics World Heritage Area，WTWHA）以其野生动物资源、生物多样性与自然景观之美闻名于世，但这类重要资产均未在市场中进行交易，因此均未通过明确的价格来完成估值。鉴于价格缺失并不等同于价值缺失，本项目旨在深化我们对这类非市场价值在不同利益相关群体眼中重要性的认知。一处绝美景观或是一只鹤鸵（cassowary），对于当地社区、游客以及旅游业而言，其重要性几何？倘若人们欣赏这类景观、观测这类极具魅力鸟类的机会有所增减，大众会作何感受？

本项目将为全球范围内的环境管理者提供一套图文并茂、易于理解的评估工具，用于衡量世界遗产地森林及其他景观环境中，这类非市场价值在不同利益相关群体中的重要程度。

本项目将开展以下工作：
1. 开发一套调研问卷，用以评估湿热带世界遗产地核心"价值"（如鹤鸵（cassowary）、蜜袋鼯（mahogany sugar glider）、瀑布、景观美学）与其他"价值"（如道路开发、就业或收入）之间的相对重要性，以便管理者能够权衡核心遗产地属性与其他价值之间的利弊取舍；
2. 以离场调查的形式，在全年不同时段（以控制数据的季节性影响）向湿热带世界遗产地全境的居民（住户）以及凯恩斯机场的游客发放问卷；
3. 采用多元分析法对调研结果开展分析，以衡量不同利益相关群体的满意度与相对价值，并基于分析结果确定保护与营销工作的优先事项。