@article{Birol:51692,
      recid = {51692},
      author = {Birol, Ekin and Koundouri, Phoebe and Kountouris, Yiannis},
      title = {Assessing the economic viability of alternative water  resources in water scarce regions: The roles of economic  valuation, cost–benefit analysis and discounting},
      address = {2009},
      number = {1005-2016-79310},
      series = {Contributed Paper},
      year = {2009},
      abstract = {This paper demonstrates a comprehensive methodology to  assess the viability of an environmental management plan  which has long-run economic and ecological impacts. The  case study under consideration is the implementation of a  water resource management plan in a water scarce region of  the world, namely Cyprus. Specifically this plan proposes  to replenish a depleting aquifer with treated wastewater.  The methodology proposed first identifies the key  stakeholder groups, namely farmers and the general public,  who are hypothesized to derive economic values (benefits)  from the implementation of this plan, and then implements  stated preference methods to capture the total economic  value of these benefits. Benefits are aggregated over the  relevant populations of these stakeholder groups and  weighed against the total costs of implementing this plan  in a long-run cost-benefit analysis (CBA). An  econometrically estimated time declining trajectory of  discount rates is used for the CBA in order to assess the  long run sustainability of the plan. The results reveal  that the net benefit trajectory estimated with the time  declining discount rate takes thrice as long to come to a  plateau, revealing the importance of using declining  discount rates, as well as capturing the entirety of  benefits generated by such plans. This methodology is  recommended especially for the implementation of the EU  Water Framework Directive which advocates the use of the  CBA and consideration of the notion of sustainability for  the achievement of the good water status for all European  waters.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/51692},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.51692},
}