Damage assessment

1
Forest Fire Valluation A Survey
Pere Riera UAB Robert Mavsar SFI Joan Mogas -
URV
2
Introduction

• Survey limited to
• Papers in English
• Mostly journal published (non-grey) literature
• Restricted to accounting for costs and benefits
  in relation to forest fires
• Interested in seeing how, how much and where

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Fire phases typology

• Prevention
• Wildfire
• Restoration

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Restoration

• Immediate costs
• e.g. mulching, erosion barriers, seeding
• Prolonged costs
• e.g. reforestation, infrastructure
  reconstruction, research projects

5
Restoration
6
Wildfire

• Suppression costs
• Damage costs

7
Wildfire, suppression

• Suppression costs
• personal, equipment, logistic costs, etc.

8
Wildfire, suppression
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Wildfire, damages

• Market goods damage accounting
• timber, property losses, economic activity
  losses, etc.

10
Wildfire, damages
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Wildfire, damages

• Non-market goods damage accounting
• biodiversity, health effects, habitats, etc.

12
Wildfire, damages
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Prevention measures

• Main types of prevention measures
• Prescribed burning
• Mechanical treatments
• Chemical treatments

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Prevention measures

• Main costs
• Implementation costs
• Market goods damage accounting
• Non-market goods damage accounting

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Prevention measures

• Cost comparison
• analyzing costs
• different types of prevention measures

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Prevention measures
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Prevention measures

• Benefit comparison
• with and without prevention measures

Prescribed burning (certainty)
Wildfire (uncertainty)
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Prevention measures
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Prevention measures

• Cost benefit analysis of prescribed burning

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Conclusions

• Conclusions are drawn from a survey with some
  limitations (mainly from papers published in
  English)
• Little attention to the economics of forest fires
  when compared to other disciplines

21
Conclusions

• For restoration
• very few papers
• market price based
• For wildfire
• a great deal of dispersion on values
• market price approaches still dominate
• For prevention
• some consensus on prescribed burning as best
  measure
• Contingent valuation dominated

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Conclusions

• Geographically, USA dominance in the studies
• Not much in Mediterranean forests (except for
  California)
• Studies tend to be driven
• by compensation (wildfire) or
• by policy (wildfire and prevention)

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http//www.medforex.net/paperspere.riera_at_ua
b.es