Heterogeneity in Preferences for Nonfinancial Incentives to Engage Landholders in Native Vegetation Management

Abstract

Most of Australia’s native forest vegetation is located on private land, and conservation success often depends on landholders’ participation in bush management programs. To understand landholders’ preferences for these programs’ attributes, we surveyed 251 landholders within historical deforestation hot spots across Queensland, Australia. Landholders were asked to make pairwise comparisons of 10 nonfinancial incentives and one financial compensation scheme. Based on a latent class analysis, we identify three distinct landholder classes. We discuss the implication of our results for the future design of native vegetation management and conservation policy instruments.