Browsing by Author "Chen, Yu"
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Item Conservation Professional Attitudes about Cost Effectiveness of the Land Preservation: A Case Study in Maryland(Department of Applied Economics and Statistics, University of Delaware, Newark, DE., 2014-03) Messer, Kent D.; Allen, William; Kecinski, Maik; Chen, YuA consensus exists amongst academics that cost-effective land preservation should involve benefits and costs. In reality, the vast majority of conservation programs are not cost-effective, i.e. lower conservation benefits are achieved for the limited funding. Little research has been conducted about the attitudes of conservation professionals about the importance of being cost-effective and little is known about how conservation professionals believe that they can become more cost-effective. This study reports on a survey conducted with conservation professionals associated with the State of Maryland’s agricultural protection program, a leading program in the United States. Results suggest that while conservation professionals are generally in favor cost-effective conservation, it is not a top goal for them. Processes such as transparency and fairness are rated more important. This research shows how the willingness of administrators to adopt mathematical programming techniques is significantly influenced by knowledge of optimization technique, administrative requirements, cost concerns, percentage of agricultural land previously preserved in the county, how rural the county is, and lack of incentive for administrators to adopt cost-effectiveness techniques. This finding is important to understand the lack of adoption of cost-effective techniques. Results also suggest that adoption may be enhanced with the availability of software and training.Item Developing a best practice framework for the Maryland agricultural land preservation foundation: Why don’t conservation professionals use optimization?(University of Delaware, 2010) Chen, YuIn the state of Maryland, government agencies charged with preserving agricultural land traditionally employ a rank-based selection process that ignores opportunities to acquire low-cost, high-benefit parcels. The potential benefit of applying an optimization method to these selection processes has been established in the literature but not recognized in practice. This study examines the methods currently in use by Maryland‘s counties in selecting parcels for preservation. It then identifies obstacles to adoption of optimization methods and, using a two-part survey instrument, examines the effect of an educational presentation about optimization on administrators‘ willingness to adopt it. Administrators put a high value on the fairness and transparency of the selection process. Parcel costs are rarely part of the calculation so funds may be used inefficiently. The survey results indicate that a better understanding of optimization increases willingness to adopt it and decreases predicted difficulties with adoption. Also, administrators in metro areas are more willing to consider optimization methods than those in more rural areas. The study shows that lack of experience with optimization, the initial technical investment required to use it, and a lack of incentive to change selection methods are the main obstacles that influence these decisions.