Economic Assessment of Environmental Damages Caused by Drying up of Hamoon Wetland in Sistan Region

Abstract

Wetlands play an important role in the prosperity of society in developing countries through the provision of goods and services that are used directly or indirectly, and therefore they are valuable. In this article, the value of carbon sequestration, oxygen production, water conservation and soil conservation were estimated to assess the economic losses caused by drought. the information needed to estimate the value of the production and regulation functions were obtained from Environmental protection organizations, The Forest Service, Rangeland and Watershed and previous studies, in the year of 2015. The production and regulation functions were estimated by using the market valuation method, alternative cost and shadow price. The results show that the functions of regulating gas (carbon absorption and oxygen production) are 86920, Conserving soil and water conservation is 174004/31, 1629163/63 $. and the total value of the regulatory functions of Hamoon wetland is 165/071 billion. Estimated values for Hamoon wetland ecosystems have two major applications: first, in cost-benefit analysis, gaining economic support for the protection of Hamoon wetland and can be used to determine the number of damages and destruction of wetlands caused by drought. Second, the estimated value can be used in the production of the gross domestic product.

Keywords

• economic assessment
• environmental damage
• ecosystem
• hamoon wetland