Working Papers

The WNE Working Papers series has been published by the Faculty of Economic Sciences at the University of Warsaw since 2008.

The WNE Working Papers series provides a fast, open channel for disseminating research conducted at the Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw. The papers hosted here are working versions (pre-prints) and may evolve as authors refine their analyses, incorporate feedback, or progress through formal peer-review. What you read is the current version released by the authors, timestamped and assigned DOI/ISSN identifiers to ensure precise citation and version tracking. Copyright remains with the authors, who may, at any time, upload a revised file or add a note directing readers to a later, peer-reviewed publication.

The Working Papers series accepts articles by research employees of the Faculty and publications from conferences organised at the Faculty of Economic Sciences at the University of Warsaw. Articles should be original research papers which have not been previously published, on the subject of economics.

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Number of Results 7

WP(25/2026)519. Biodiversity-oriented forest management aligns with societal preferences across Europe

Authors: Giergiczny Marek, Jacobsen Jette Bredahl, Glenk Klaus, Meyerhoff Jürgen, Abildtrup Jens, Taye Fitalew Agimass, Budziński Wiktor, Czajkowski Mikołaj, Draus Borys, Faccioli Michela, Gajderowicz Tomasz, Getzner Michael, Hackbarth Tom X., Janiec Piotr, Lundhede Thomas, Mayer Marius, McVittie Alistair, Oh Rachel, Olschewski Roland, Pereira Henrique M., Quaas Martin, Socha Jarosław, Strange Niels, Ščasný Milan, Valasiuk Sviataslau, Wasiak Adam, Fernández Néstor
Forests across Europe are undergoing rapid transformation as biodiversity loss and climate change reshape priorities for forest management. Strategies that promote biodiverse and structurally complex forests are increasingly advocated to enhance ecol…

WP519. Biodiversity-oriented forest management aligns with societal preferences across Europe

Forests across Europe are undergoing rapid transformation as biodiversity loss and climate change reshape priorities for forest management. Strategies that promote biodiverse and structurally complex forests are increasingly advocated to enhance ecological resilience, yet they are often assumed to conflict with societal preferences, potentially limiting public support for conservation and restoration. We examined whether forest characteristics associated with biodiversity conservation and climate adaptation are consistently valued by society across Europe. We combined a visual discrete choice experiment involving 11,622 respondents from twelve European countries with a travel cost model to evaluate whether stated societal preferences were reflected in observed recreational behaviour. We then integrated harmonized preference estimates with continental forest inventory and remote-sensing data to map the spatial distribution of societal values associated with forest ecosystem condition. Across all countries, respondents consistently preferred forests characterized by taller canopies, greater tree-species richness, heterogeneous age structures, and more deadwood. These preferences closely aligned with observed visitation behaviour despite substantial differences in geography, accessibility, and recreational traditions. Spatial analyses further showed that forests with greater structural complexity consistently exhibited higher societal value. Our findings demonstrate that biodiversity-oriented forest management and societal values largely converge across Europe, suggesting that many interventions promoting ecological resilience can simultaneously strengthen public support for forest conservation and restoration, providing a stronger foundation for adaptive, multifunctional forest governance under global environmental change.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.25.519
Giergiczny Marek, Jacobsen Jette Bredahl, Glenk Klaus, Meyerhoff Jürgen, Abildtrup Jens, Taye Fitalew Agimass, Budziński Wiktor, Czajkowski Mikołaj, Draus Borys, Faccioli Michela, Gajderowicz Tomasz, Getzner Michael, Hackbarth Tom X., Janiec Piotr, Lundhede Thomas, Mayer Marius, McVittie Alistair, Oh Rachel, Olschewski Roland, Pereira Henrique M., Quaas Martin, Socha Jarosław, Strange Niels, Ščasný Milan, Valasiuk Sviataslau, Wasiak Adam, Fernández Néstor
biodiversity conservation forest management structural complexity forest recreation ecosystem services discrete choice experiment travel cost method

WP(22/2026)516. When Risk Information Changes the Trip: Evidence from a Randomized Panel Combining Discrete Choice and Travel Cost Methods

Authors: Czajkowski Mikołaj, Zawadzki Wojciech, Skrzypek Katarzyna, Budziński Wiktor, Ščasnŷ Milan
Coastal bathing delivers large welfare benefits but exposes recreationists to low-probability, high-salience microbial risks that are likely to become more frequent under climate change. Because these risks are largely invisible, behaviour and welfar…

WP516. When Risk Information Changes the Trip: Evidence from a Randomized Panel Combining Discrete Choice and Travel Cost Methods

Coastal bathing delivers large welfare benefits but exposes recreationists to low-probability, high-salience microbial risks that are likely to become more frequent under climate change. Because these risks are largely invisible, behaviour and welfare depend on beliefs and the effectiveness of risk communication. We provide causal evidence on how pathogen-risk information affects preferences and recreation demand using a three-wave panel survey of users of the Gulf of Gdańsk and the Vistula Lagoon (Poland). A stratified national sample identified 3,312 active coastal users in Wave 1 (spring 2024); 2,588 respondents returned in Wave 2 (summer 2024), where they were randomly assigned to receive either minimal information or increasingly detailed pathogen-risk scripts, and then completed a repeated beach-site discrete choice experiment. Approximately one year later (spring 2025), 1,507 users completed a policy-referendum discrete choice experiment on programs combining water-quality improvements, monitoring frequency, and household costs, alongside a repeated travel-cost module capturing multi-day trips and beach outings. Information treatments significantly increased objective and self-assessed knowledge and selectively raised willingness to travel/pay for risk-relevant attributes – especially frequent water-quality monitoring and water-quality improvements – while leaving unrelated attributes largely unchanged. Travel-cost models indicate that information affects trip-taking behaviour, yet the marginal travel-cost sensitivity remains stable, consistent with a demand shift rather than a change in the “price” slope. The results imply that welfare estimates are information-dependent and that credible risk communication can function as a scalable, low-cost complement to traditional coastal health-risk management.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.22.516
Czajkowski Mikołaj, Zawadzki Wojciech, Skrzypek Katarzyna, Budziński Wiktor, Ščasnŷ Milan
Bathing water quality Pathogens Microbial contamination Risk communication Information treatments Discrete choice experiment (DCE) Travel cost method (TCM) Recreation demand Welfare measurement Consumer surplus Climate adaptation Coastal health risks Baltic Sea Poland

WP(5/2024)441. How stable and predictable are welfare estimates using recreation demand models?

Authors: Lloyd-Smith Patrick, Zawojska Ewa
Economic analysis of environmental policy projects typically use pre-existing welfare estimates that are then transferred over time to the policy relevant periods. Understanding how stable and predictable these welfare estimates are over time is impo…

WP441. How stable and predictable are welfare estimates using recreation demand models?

Economic analysis of environmental policy projects typically use pre-existing welfare estimates that are then transferred over time to the policy relevant periods. Understanding how stable and predictable these welfare estimates are over time is important for applying these estimates in policy. Yet, revealed preference models of recreation demand have received few temporal stability assessments compared to other non-market valuation methods. We use a large administrative dataset on campground reservations covering ten years to study temporal stability and predictability of recreation demand welfare estimates of lake water quality changes. Based on single-year models, our findings suggest welfare estimates are temporally stable across years in around 50% of the comparisons. Using an event study design, we find evidence that welfare estimates are stable within a year, that is, for weeks after a change in water quality. Our findings further reveal that having two years of data for predicting welfare estimates in subsequent years improves the prediction accuracy by 22% relative to using a single year of data, but further improvements in the prediction accuracy are modest when including additional years of data. Predictions of welfare estimates are not necessarily improved when using data closer in time to the prediction year. We discuss the implications of our results for using revealed preference studies in policy analysis.


Lloyd-Smith Patrick, Zawojska Ewa
recreation demand revealed preferences temporal stability prediction accuracy water quality welfare estimates

WP(11/2018)270. Recreational Value of the Baltic Sea: a Spatially Explicit Site Choice Model Accounting for Environmental Conditions

Authors: Czajkowski Mikołaj, Zandersen Marianne, Aslam Uzma, Angelidis Ioannis, Becker Thomas, Budziński Wiktor, Zagórska Katarzyna
The Baltic Sea plays a significant role for recreational use in the nine littoral countries with more than 70% of the population visiting the coast, representing some 80 million recreation visits annually. Understanding the values associated with coa…

WP270. Recreational Value of the Baltic Sea: a Spatially Explicit Site Choice Model Accounting for Environmental Conditions

The Baltic Sea plays a significant role for recreational use in the nine littoral countries with more than 70% of the population visiting the coast, representing some 80 million recreation visits annually. Understanding the values associated with coastal recreation and the potential welfare changes of improving the state of the Baltic Sea is important for managing the marine environment. We estimate a spatially explicit travel cost model of coastal site recreation to the Baltic Sea to assess the welfare of accessing individual sites, identify recreational hotspots and simulate the welfare changes resulting from improving environmental and infrastructure conditions. The total benefits associated with the Baltic Sea based recreation amount to 11.4 billion EUR per year with significant variation across sites. Improving water quality and infrastructure boost the recreational value by nearly 9 billion EUR, almost doubling the recreational benefits compared to current conditions.


DOI: http://doi.org.10.26405/WP/WNE/2018/270/011
Czajkowski Mikołaj, Zandersen Marianne, Aslam Uzma, Angelidis Ioannis, Becker Thomas, Budziński Wiktor, Zagórska Katarzyna
Recreational benefits Site choice Random Utility Model Baltic Sea Blue Flag

WP(5/2013)90. Providing Preference-Based Support for Forest Ecosystem Service Management in Poland

Authors: Czajkowski Mikołaj, Bartczak Anna, Giergiczny Marek, Stale Navrud, Żylicz Tomasz
The paper looks at people's preferences for the changes in selected ecosystem services resulting from new management strategies of forest areas in Poland. It applies a generalized multinomial logit (G-MNL) model to interpret the results of a disc…

WP90. Providing Preference-Based Support for Forest Ecosystem Service Management in Poland

The paper looks at people's preferences for the changes in selected ecosystem services resulting from new management strategies of forest areas in Poland. It applies a generalized multinomial logit (G-MNL) model to interpret the results of a discrete choice experiment (DCE) study administered to a representative sample of 1001 Poles. The questionnaire included three physical attributes, namely: protecting the most ecologically valuable forest ecosystems, reducing litter in forests, and improving recreation infrastructure. The selection of these attributes was motivated by extensive qualitative research of what indicators of biodiversity, nature protection and recreation possibilities people are the most sensitive to. The fourth attribute was monetary - additional cost of the new programs which would have to be financed out of increased taxes. The results allowed for a robust estimation of implicit prices of the choice attributes and calculating welfare measures of specific forest management scenarios. In addition, the study revealed interesting connections between respondents' current forest recreation patterns and the importance they place on different attributes of forests. The results make it possible to utilize respondents' preference heterogeneity, to a large extent determined by their current recreational use patterns, in designing future forest management strategies.


Czajkowski Mikołaj, Bartczak Anna, Giergiczny Marek, Stale Navrud, Żylicz Tomasz
Biodiversity forest recreation discrete choice modeling generalized multinomial logit model

WP(11/2012)77. The economic value of a White Stork nesting colony: a case of 'stork village' in Poland

Authors: Czajkowski Mikołaj, Giergiczny Marek, Kronenberg Jakub, Tryjanowski Piotr
In this paper we estimate the economic value of selected ecosystem services provided by White Storks in a Polish 'stork village'. A stork village is a common name for a village with a White Stork breeding colony, often inhabited by more stork…

WP77. The economic value of a White Stork nesting colony: a case of 'stork village' in Poland

In this paper we estimate the economic value of selected ecosystem services provided by White Storks in a Polish 'stork village'. A stork village is a common name for a village with a White Stork breeding colony, often inhabited by more storks than people. Zywkowo, the best known stork village in Poland, receives 2000-5000 tourists annually, many of whom come from abroad. The village has about 20-40 White Stork nests and several amenities aiming at improving its recreational attractiveness. To estimate the economic benefits provided by the stork village we apply the travel cost method. This is the first study of this kind for a stork village, and the first study related to the value of birds in Poland. Our results provide a useful input into policy and decision making, indicating that nature has economic value. It also serves as a clear illustration that degradation of nature may entail economic losses.


Czajkowski Mikołaj, Giergiczny Marek, Kronenberg Jakub, Tryjanowski Piotr
recreational value of birds; valuation of non-market goods; travel cost method

WP(8/2012)74. Learning and Fatigue Effects Revisited. The Impact of Accounting for Unobservable Preference and Scale Heterogeneity on Perceived Ordering Effects in Multiple Choice Task Discrete Choice Experiments

Authors: Czajkowski Mikołaj, Giergiczny Marek, Greene William H.
Using multiple choice tasks per respondent in discrete choice experiment studies increase the amount of available information. However, treating repeated choice data in the same way as cross-sectional data may lead to biased estimates. In particular,…

WP74. Learning and Fatigue Effects Revisited. The Impact of Accounting for Unobservable Preference and Scale Heterogeneity on Perceived Ordering Effects in Multiple Choice Task Discrete Choice Experiments

Using multiple choice tasks per respondent in discrete choice experiment studies increase the amount of available information. However, treating repeated choice data in the same way as cross-sectional data may lead to biased estimates. In particular, respondents' learning and fatigue may lead to changes in observed utility function preference (taste) parameters, as well as its error term variance (scale). Substantial body of empirical research offers mixed evidence in terms of whether (and which) of these ordering effects are observed. In this study we point to a significant component in explaining these differences - we show how accounting for unobservable preference and scale heterogeneity can influence the magnitude of observed ordering effects, especially if combined with too few choice tasks used for the analysis. We do this by utilizing the state-of-the-art modeling methods (H-MNL, S-MNL, H-RPL, G-MNL) which we modify to accommodate choice task specific scale parameter. In addition, we investigate possible bias resulting from not accounting for ordering effects. Our empirical study was based in the context of environmental protection - management changes in the protection of Polish forests.


Czajkowski Mikołaj, Giergiczny Marek, Greene William H.
ordering effects learning fatigue preference and scale heterogeneity forest management recreation biodiversity
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