Valuing the Environment in Conservation Economics: Conceptual and Structural Barriers

Valuing conservation and biodiversity outcomes in economic analysis is difficult, as it is in health economics. Because health economics has previously had to respond to the many challenges currently faced by conservation economics, health economists have developed very successful tools for responding to these challenges which conservation economists can draw upon. What is surprising is that despite rhetorical support for the use of these economic analysis tools in conservation valuations, in practice, these economic tools are used far less frequently in conservation and biodiversity decision then they are in health decisions. Drawing on a simple database search and an analysis of universities that lead in both economics and environmental studies, this paper considers why conservation economists stick with philosophically and pragmatically difficult economic tools when they have other options, and argues that part of the reasons is the way conservation economics is framed and conceptualised.