Bo Jellesmark Thorsen

• DSc, PhD, MSc
• Dean at University of Copenhagen

Organic farming is based on the concept of working 'with nature' instead of against it; however, compared with conventional farming, organic farming reportedly has lower productivity. Ideally, the goal should be to narrow this yield gap. In this review, we specifically discuss the feasibility of new breeding techniques (NBTs) for rewilding, a proce...

Stated preference studies tell respondents that policies create environmental changes with varying levels of uncertainty. However, respondents may include their own a priori assessments of uncertainty when making choices among policy options. Using a choice experiment eliciting respondents’ preferences for conservation policies under climate change...

A key prerequisite to ensure that payment for ecosystem services is effective is that the management measures landowners are paid to undertake are in fact additional to the status quo and hence bring about a change in provision. We investigated Danish forest owners' preferences for conditional contracts for the provision of ecosystem services in Na...

Sustainable agriculture in response to increasing demands for food depends on development of high-yielding crops with high nutritional value that require minimal intervention during growth. Focus so far has been on changing plants by introducing genes that impart new properties, which the plants and their ancestors never possessed. By contrast, we...

The natural environment is central to human well-being through its role in ecosystem service (ES) provision. Managing ES often requires coordination across international borders. Although this may deliver greater conservation gains than countries acting alone, we do not know whether the public supports such an international approach. Using the same...

European countries have committed to ambitious upscaling of privately funded nature conservation. We review the status and drivers of biodiversity finance in Europe. By implementing semistructured interviews with 25 biodiversity finance key informants and three focus groups across Europe, we explore opportunities and challenges for upscaling privat...

Forests supply multiple ecosystem services, categorized into provisioning (e.g. wood), regulating (e.g. climate change mitigation, biodiversity protection) and cultural (e.g. recreation) services. While European policies have set the target for forest management to supply multiple ecosystem services, the literature emphasises that regulating and cu...

European countries have committed to ambitious upscaling of privately-funded nature conservation activities. We review the status and drivers of biodiversity finance in Europe. By implementing semi-structured interviews with 25 elite biodiversity finance key informants and three focus groups across Europe, we then explore opportunities and challeng...

European countries have committed to ambitious upscaling of privately-funded nature conservation activities. We review the status and drivers of biodiversity finance in Europe. By implementing semi-structured interviews with 25 elite biodiversity finance key informants and three focus groups across Europe, we then explore opportunities and challeng...

Biodiversity credits are an emerging vehicle for pro-environmental financing. Here we define and delimit biodiversity credits and explore the pathways through which credits can be issued. We scrutinize early evidence from pilots and suggest lessons from other market-based incentives for conservation and climate mitigation, including biodiversity of...

Biodiversity credits are an emerging vehicle for pro-environmental financing. Here we define and delimit biodiversity credits, explore their impact pathways, discuss potential future supply and demand, bundling/stacking options, and needed social safeguards. We scrutinize early evidence from 34 pilots and suggest lessons from other market-based inc...

Årene siden årtusindskiftet har budt på massive forandringer for de danske universiteter. I de senere år er de offentlige bevillinger stagneret, men til gengæld vokser bevillingerne fra private fonde og har fået et betydeligt omfang. Der er meget godt at sige om denne udvikling. Det betyder, at der er flere, som tager et betydeligt ansvar for at ho...

Climate policies aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions embodied in the built environment support the wider implementation of multi-storey wooden buildings. A body of research on public perceptions toward wood as a structural building material is emerging, but close examination of behavioral factors underpinning prospective dwelling is scarce. W...

The data contains 716 individual decisions and responses from a lab-in-field experiment and an exit questionnaire that were conducted in Denmark, Spain, and Ghana. Individuals were initially asked to perform a small effort task (i.e., correctly counting the number of 1’s and 0’s in a page) to earn money and subsequently asked how much of their earn...

Europe's forest provide multiple ecosystem services for societies, ranging from provisioning (e.g. wood) and regulating (e.g. climate mitigation and biodiversity) to cultural (e.g. recreation) services. In this paper, we assess the state and prospects of forest ecosystem services provision in Europe, introducing new data from the European collabora...

Aim of the report - This report aims to explore the importance of biodiversity in the context of European forests and to make suggestions on how this biodiversity can be effectively maintained and enhanced through protection, management and restoration. The term Europe in this document means European Union, except where mentioned otherwise. The rep...

Forests provide ecosystem services, including timber production. In some cases, private forest owners perform management actions in order to enhance the provision of such services, or they may be encouraged by public policies and payments. This paper focuses specifically on the decision to set forest land aside for biodiversity conservation, as par...

We designed a discrete choice experiment testing valence-based framing of climate policy outcomes for future generations, a moral good involving altruistic trade-offs. Specifically, we explore how a gain and loss framing influence social preferences for the distributional outcomes of climate policy. Respondents are asked to consider climate policy...

We analyze housing markets in a suburb north of the Danish capital Copenhagen. There the concentration of affluent households decreases rapidly with distance to nature. This indicates systematic differences in preferences that are highly correlated with demographics. We assess if and to what extent this is the case by conducting a second-stage hedo...

So far, consumer housing values have not been addressed as factors affecting the market diffusion potential of multi-storey wood building (MSWB). To fill the void, this study addresses different types of consumer housing values in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden (i.e., Nordic region), and whether they affect the likelihood of prejudices agains...

In the last two decades, attention on forests and ownership rights has increased in different domains of international policy, particularly in relation to achieving the global sustainable development goals. This paper looks at the changes in forest-specific legislation applicable to regular productive forests, across 28 European countries. We compa...

The behavior among peers may be interpreted as usefulinformation in individuals' decision processes, althoughsuch observational learning is typically not accommodatedin consume choice models. This study incorporates in-formation about other consumers' behavior in a choiceexperiment to evaluate if it affects choice probabilities.Market share is used...

Two important aspects of global environmental problems are that (1) the actions of past generations affect the opportunities of the present, and (2) both in the past and the present generations, collaboration across different countries is needed to provide global public goods. In this paper, we study how these two aspects influence public good prov...

Several discrete choice experiment studies have investigated issues in the design of incentive programs to enhance the provision of ecosystem services. In these studies, ownership of land is usually private, and landowners make decisions independently of each other. However, the assumption of independence may be invalid when decision making involve...

What role do people think distributional aspects should play in the design of climate policy? The literature assessing climate policies has shown that assumptions regarding peoples’ distributional preferences for climate change policy impacts are central for policy assessment, but empirical evidence for such preferences is lacking. We design a disc...

Coral reefs ecosystems fulfil important ecological functions, but risk degradation not only from climate change but also from increasing demands for the socioeconomic functions they also offer to local communities and international tourism. Coral reef diving tourism is a source of environmental pressure but at the same time represents a source of c...

Efficient biodiversity conservation may rest on support for transnational cooperation; particularly for migratory species. Support for transnational conservation efforts may hinge on key issues like the potential outcomes and whether any collaboration aspect is highlighted. We designed an experiment focused on conservation of open land habitats in...

We examined the preferences for wetland conservation among urban and rural dwellers in Malaysia. A choice experiment using face-to-face interviews with urban and rural households was employed. Wetland conservation alternatives were described in terms of environmental protection zones, biodiversity protection, recreational services and flood. Each a...

A better understanding of how society anticipates and adapts to future changes is critical to inform impact assessment and to develop timely and well-targeted policies to support adaptation. However, the forward-looking adaptation process remains poorly understood. In this paper we introduce choice experiment as a useful approach to investigate how...

International efforts to protect biodiversity depend on transnational collaboration and on public support for transnational policies to be implemented. Yet, we know little about what may compel citizens to support such transnational conservation efforts. In this paper, we design a lab-in-the-field experiment to explore how different framings and in...

Selecting appropriate payment vehicles is critical for the perceived consequentiality and incentive compatibility of stated preferences surveys. We analyze the performance of three different payment vehicles in a Malaysian case of valuing wetland conservation. Two are well-known: voluntary donations and income taxes. The third is new: reductions in...

The hedonic pricing method has been used extensively to obtain implicit prices for availability of urban green space, but few have obtained households’ preference parameters. We elicit preferences and estimate willingness to pay functions for park availability in Copenhagen using an approach that places identifying restrictions on the utility funct...

In this book we summarize and present the results of the last 25 years of environmental economics research in Denmark addressing the valuation of environmental goods and services. The book is in Danish.

Private forests are widespread in Europe providing a range of ecosystem services of significant value to society, and there are calls for novel policies to enhance their provision and to face the challenges of environmental changes. Such policies need to acknowledge the importance of private forests, and importantly they need to be based on a deep...

This study addresses the attitudes of the urban and rural dwellers towards Setiu Wetlands conservation. The New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) scale is adopted to measure the degree of environmental concern. A series of factor analysis and regression is applied to analyze the urban-rural attitudes and to suggest three factors structure of attitudes to w...

We present the results of a large-scale analysis on how on-shore and off-shore wind turbines affect the property prices of nearby single family residential and vacation homes in Denmark. We find that on-shore wind turbines negatively affect the price of surrounding properties to a distance of three kilometers. The negative impact increases with the...

The Danish government has set specific goals for setting aside forest land for biodiversity purposes in the form of untouched forests, where no production forestry operations can be undertaken. Part of these goals will be fulfilled on public and state owned forest land, and parts will be fulfilled on private lands. Setting aside forest land as unto...

The Faustmann forest rotation model is a celebrated contribution in economics. The model provides a forest value expression and allows a solution to the optimal rotation problem valid for perpetual rotations of even-aged forest stands. However, continuous forest cover forest management systems imply uneven-aged dynamics, and while a number of numer...

Coordination of conservation policies and conservation actions between countries is expected to reduce overall costs and increase effectiveness. It rests on the assumption that, as a global public good, the provision of biodiversity conservation is independent of geographical and political jurisdictions. However, from a welfare economic perspective...

Private forests are widespread in Europe providing a range of ecosystem services of significant value to society, and there are calls for novel policies to enhance their provision and to face the challenges of environmental changes. Such policies need to acknowledge the importance of private forests, and importantly they need to be based on a deep...

Adapting the management of forest resources to climate change involves addressing several crucial aspects to provide a valid basis for decision making. These include the knowledge and belief of decision makers, the mapping of management options for the current as well as anticipated future bioclimatic and socioeconomic conditions, and the ways deci...

Everyday, we are bombarded with periodic, exogenous appeals and instructions on how to behave. How do these appeals and instructions affect subsequent coordination? Using experimental methods, we investigate how a one-time exogenous instruction affects subsequent coordination among individuals in a lab. Participants play a minimum effort game repea...

Statistical test: Demographics. (PDF)

Summary statistics: Demographics. (PDF)

Results for t-tests. (PDF)

Experiment instructions, questionnaire and consent form. Experiment instructions for the minimum effort game with and without intervention. Since rounds 3, 4 and 5 are rounds with no intervention, the instructions for these rounds are exactly the same as the instructions for round 2 without intervention. Instruction for round 1 with intervention is...

Det danske skovbrug syner ikke af meget i nationalregnskabet, men som traditionsrigt erhverv og element i landskabet, kulturen og danskernes hverdag er skovene af stor betydning. Dette har præget den økonomiske og politiske udvikling omkring skovene i århundreder.

Peri-urban pressure on the Luki Biosphere Reserve in Bas-Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, is fuelled by growing demand in urban markets coupled with easy access. With data from 175 randomly selected households, this paper examines factors that motivate households to collect two major forest products found in the reserve for cash. We analyse the...

Consumers are apprehensive about transgenic technologies, so cisgenics, which limit gene transfers to sexually compatible organisms, have been suggested to address consumer concerns. We study consumer preferences for rye bread alternatives based on transgenic or cisgenic rye, grown conventionally or without the use of pesticides, relative to tradit...

The EU Water Framework Directive aims to ensure restoration of Europe’s water bodies to “good ecological status” by 2027. Many Member States will struggle to meet this target, with around half of EU river catchments currently reporting below standard water quality. Diffuse pollution from agriculture represents a major pressure, affecting over 90% o...

The domestication of new crops would promote agricultural diversity and could provide a solution to many of the problems associated with intensive agriculture. We suggest here that genome editing can be used as a new tool by breeders to accelerate the domestication of semi-domesticated or even wild plants, building a more varied foundation for the...

PES could become an important tool for forest-based climate change mitigation under REDD+. But proper design of such incentive instruments requires prior knowledge about the variation of conservation opportunity costs among landowners and users. It is thus recommendable to compare and improve methods for assessing opportunity cost. We investigated...

We propose a spatial multi-criteria decision analysis approach as a value-focused decision support tool for evaluating land use change decisions affecting multiple ecosystem services. In an empirical case study concerned with creating a robust and interconnected network of natural areas in a Danish municipality, we first conduct a biophysical and e...

Preference elicitation among outdoor recreational users is subject to measurement errors that depend, in part, on survey planning. This study uses data from a choice experiment survey on recreational SCUBA diving to investigate whether self-reported information on respondents’ comfort when they complete surveys correlates with the error variance in...

Popular-scientific article in the Danish magazine SKOVEN

Popular-scientific article in the Danish magazine SKOVEN

Popular-scientific article for Danish magazine SKOVEN

Popular-scientific article in Danish magazine SKOVEN

The hedonic pricing method has been used extensively to obtain implicit prices for availability of urban green space, but few hedonic studies have obtained households’ preference parameters. We estimate willingness to pay functions for park availability in Copenhagen using an approach that places identifying restrictions on the utility function. We...

The protected coral reefs off the coast of Malaysia receive numerous tourists, while also being as fishing grounds. These joint environmental pressures raise the need for additional costly conservation measures. It is natural to consider the potential for expanding the 'user pays' principle, already implemented in the form of various user fees. Thi...

A number of methods exist for estimating the size of animal populations. All methods generate an uncertain estimate of population size, and have different properties, which can be taken into account when designing regulation. We consider hunting regulation when the population size is uncertain and when the self-reported bag is used to estimate the...

This study addresses the attitudes of the urban and rural dwellers towards Setiu Wetlands conservation. The New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) scale is adopted to measure the degree of environmental concern. A series of factor analysis and regression is applied to analyze the urban-rural attitudes and three factors structure of attitudes to wetland cons...

Conclusions This report sheds light on what forest areas in Denmark should be given priority in a cost-effective effort for the conservation of biodiversity in the Danish forests. It also examines what such efforts will cost, and what it may mean for the provision of other ecosystem services from the forest's. The main conclusions are as follows:...

This file contains the full report text of "State of Europe's Forest 2015". Due to size limitations, the annexes are presented in a separate file upload. Together the two files make up the entire 314 pages report.

This study addresses the attitudes of the urban and rural dwellers towards Setiu Wetlands conservation. The New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) scale is adopted to measure the degree of environmental concern. A series of factor analysis and regression is applied to analyze the urban-rural attitudes and three factors structure of attitudes to wetland cons...

I de senere år har en række dyrearter holdt deres indtog i Danmark til glæde for nogle og til gene for andre. Ulven er genindvandret til de jyske landskaber efter omtrent 200 års fravær. Det indebærer udfordringer for forvaltere af naturen, men samtidig rejser der sig naturligt en lang række spørgsmål hos danskere i både byerne og på landet – bland...

The Summary for Policy Makers is a brief document based on information included in the “State of Europe’s Forests 2015”report. This document offers a comprehensive overview of European forests, their current status, trends and policy responses related to them, as well as an insight into sustainable forest management (SFM) in Europe. The State of E...

Preference surveys typically consider individuals’ preferences to be independent from each other. However, when analyzing e.g. preferences for management alternatives for common land, this assumption may be questioned as individuals factor in the spatial and social context. The aim of this study is to present an approach that validly accounts for s...

In Denmark, the right to hunt is vested with the land owner but can be transferred to others and is traded on a well-established market. The dominant form of hunting leases is time limited contract transferring the hunting rights on a piece of land to one or more persons. We analyze this market for hunting leases using the hedonic method on a rich...

The proper balance between costly monitoring and non-compliance have often been studied, however, the costs of monitoring from landowners’ perspective have only received little attention. We designed a Choice Experiment where landowners expressed their willingness to accept afforestation contracts with varying attributes, one of them being the like...

Future climate development and its effects on forest ecosystems are not easily predicted or described in terms of standard probability concepts. Nevertheless, forest managers continuously make long-term decisions that will be subject to climate change impacts. The manager's assessment of possible developments and impacts and the related uncertainty...

Wetlands that make up a large portion of the area in Malaysia are special because of diverse biological functions, ecosystem service support functions and biodiversity. The Malaysian Wetland Directory has listed about 105 of wetlands sites. However, some wetlands like the Setiu Wetland (SW) faces threats from land reclamation, pollution, and unsust...

Hedonic models in environmental valuation studies have grown in terms of number of transactions and number of explanatory variables. We focus on the practical challenge of model reduction, when aiming for reliable parsimonious models, sensitive to omitted variable bias and multicollinearity. We evaluate two common model reduction approaches in an e...

Also available from: http://www.efi.int/portal/virtual_library/publications/what_science_can_tell_us/5/

Also available from http://www.efi.int/portal/virtual_library/publications/what_science_can_tell_us/5/

Økosystemtjenester kan betragtes som økosystemernes og de tilknyttede arters bidrag til menneskers livsgrundlag og velfærd. Forringelser eller tab af økosystemtjenester er miljøforringelser, der potentielt lægger pres på nulevende og kommende generationers velfærd.

In this study we have addressed appropriate modelling of heterogeneity in willingness to pay (WTP) for environmental goods, and have demonstrated its importance using a case of forest access in Denmark. We compared WTP distributions for four models: (1) a multinomial logit model, (2) a mixed logit model assuming a univariate Normal distribution, (3...

There is increasing evidence that global climate change will alter the spatiotemporal occurrences and abundances of many species at continental scales. This will have implications for efficient conservation of biodiversity. We investigate if the general public in Denmark are willing to pay for the preservation of birds potentially immigrating and e...

We consider a hunting area and a wildlife reserve and answer the question: How does clever migration decision affect the social optimal and the private optimal hunting levels and population stocks? We analyze this in a model allowing for two-way migration between hunting and reserve areas, where the populations’ migration decisions depend on both h...

Politics increasingly introduces initiatives supporting a shift toward a bioeconomy aiming at a society relying strongly on renewable biological sources while achieving economic growth efficiently and sustainably. However, the agenda of bioeconomy comprises different “shades of green,” in the sense that different actors stress different aspects of...

The European Union (EU) energy policy has three targets: supply security, development of a competitive energy sector and environmental sustainability. The EU countries have issued so-called National Renewable Energy Action Plans (NREAP) for increased renewable energy generation. Biomass is stipulated to account for 56% of renewable energy generatio...

We examine the dynamics of household vulnerability during the past 30 years within three different social-ecological upland systems in Lijiang, Yunnan. Interviews were conducted to construct coupled human-environmental timelines to facilitate the understanding of livelihood dynamics in the context of more general changes that constitute both constr...