@article{Maalouf_Chalak_2019, place={Ithaca, NY, USA}, title={Farmers’ Willingness to Pay for Establishing a Collective Postharvest Refrigeration Unit: Evidence from an Eastern Mediterranean Rural Community}, volume={9}, url={https://foodsystemsjournal.org/index.php/fsj/article/view/715}, DOI={10.5304/jafscd.2019.091.012}, abstractNote={<p>One-third of crops harvested globally is lost due to inadequate or lack of postharvest storage facilities. This paper explores farmers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for a common refrigeration unit to reduce postharvest losses in the Bekaa valley, a Lebanese breadbasket. Using the contingent valuation (CV) method—a survey-based economic technique used mainly for the valuation of nonmarket environ­men­tal and public goods—this study was con­ducted with a sample of farmers in selected village municipalities in the area under study. The results indicate that most farmers (72%) are highly concerned about postharvest losse, and that 80% were willing to pay varying amounts for the proposed initiative, with most WTP values fall­ing within the range of US$21–US$30 per month (31%). By contrast, a consid­erable proportion of the farmers (20%) were not willing to pay any fee for establishing the common refrigeration unit. Results further establish the different small-scale farmers’ characteristics and factors affecting WTP. Some factors including longer farming experience, higher variable costs associated with farming oper­ations, working year-round in farming, and access to wholesale markets, significantly increased WTP for access to a com<sub>­</sub>mon refrigeration unit, depend­ing on the type of cultivated crops. These results are of particular interest for developing relevant policies and informing decision-making intent to solve post­harvest management issues in developing econo­mies. This study establishes the importance of offering refrigeration services at discounted or subsidized prices to smaller farmers as a public good aimed at promoting agrarian and rural development.</p> <p>See the <a title="press release archive" href="http://www.icontact-archive.com/archive?c=488966&f=60033&s=84565&m=981607&t=257c360ddc23fcec50d37942ed548ee4169a6c0d76d51e227fa886af9ecdf0c7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">press release</a> for this article. </p>}, number={1}, journal={Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development}, author={Maalouf, Amani and Chalak, Ali}, year={2019}, month={Jul.}, pages={89–99} }