ENVIRONMENTAL GOOD VALUATION: THE CASE OF DRINKING WATER IN TUNISIA

The main objective of this paper is to provide an environmental good valuation for drinking water, where we use Tunisia as the case study. Under the hypothesis of the absence of a market for the proper valuation of an environmental good or service, in this study we use the contingent valuation method (CVM) to provide an economic valuation for “drinking water” as the environmental good we are evaluating. The method, based on a consumer survey of a sample of Tunisian households, aims to identify the maximum amount that the consumer is willing to pay for an environmental good or service, in this case the provision of quality drinking water. The study’s results using the Logit and Tobit models showed that, for our case sample, the willingness to pay (WTP) varies according to a set of variables including household income, household size, availability of alternative sources of drinking water, education level of interviewee, and drinking water quality.