Estimating value of the ecosystem services in the urban and peri-urban green of a town Florina-Greece, using the CVM

ABSTRACT Over the last decades, managing urbanization poses a great challenge for many developed countries. To overcome, the negative impacts of urbanization and preserve sustainability in urban areas, governments are compelled to undertake measures, to increase the benefits derived from peri-urban and urban green spaces. In this study we tried to document the social and economic value of the peri-urban and urban green of the town of Florina. To do so, we tried to evaluate the ecosystem services that exist in these areas of the city, in monetary units, using the Contingent Valuation Method (CVM). To examine the theoretical concepts underlying urbanization and its connection to green spaces (urban and peri-urban) and ecosystem services, we decided to resort to primary data (291 questionnaires). The proposed methodology was tested in the aforementioned city, because it has lots of urban green spaces and is, in essence, surrounded by peri-urban forests. Results, demonstrated that the participants in the survey are willing to financially support and voluntarily participate in urban and peri-urban management plans. Furthermore, the results showed that the CVM method, can be successfully used to evaluate the all value of a urban and periurban green spaces in the city of Florina. Our analysis showed that in this specific case, the assessment of willingness to pay for developing green spaces (urban and peri-urban), should and can be promoted as an indispensable tool for the conservation-improvement and protection of those areas.