Evaluation Feature of Subjective Importance Assessment to Cultural Ecosystem Services in a Case of Forest in Toyota City, Japan

Abstract

In biodiversity conservation policy, there are practical needs for quantitative information on ecosystem services and/or development of its evaluation techniques. It appears to be important to understand evaluation structure of subjective importance degree on cultural ecosystem service (CES) in the context of efficient conservation planning. Thus the purpose of this study is to understand the characteristic of subjective importance degree of CES and to acquire the fundamental information on the evaluation structure of the subjective importance degree. We conducted a questionnaire survey provided from foresters in Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture, Japan. As a result, it was shown that an administrative district and visit experience have influence on importance evaluation. Moreover, the results clearly indicated that contributing factors of the subjective importance evaluation were strongly correlated with their forest favorability, experiences, intentionality, interest, and knowledge, rather than their sex, age, and occupation. Especially, it was suggested that the variables of “forest favorability” are main common variables of importance evaluation of CESs.