Land Use: Orchards & Specialty Crops
Ecosystem Service: Aesthetic / Amenity
Regional Value Estimate: $23 per acre per year
Confidence Level (in estimated value): High

How was value determined:

1. The county-level values for orchards and specialty crops aesthetic/amenity were transferred from a peer-reviewed hedonic study of housing values adjacent to agricultural lands and grasslands in Berks County, Pennsylvania (Ready and Abdalla 2005).
2. The study values were converted to a per acre figure utilizing median housing values, the average number of households, and the average amount of cropland per acre in each county (U.S. Census Bureau 2007). They were annualized using a 7% discount rate, which is the rate required by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget for most governmental agencies doing cost/benefit analysis.
3. To get a regional value, an average value of the county-level data was taken.

Value estimate limitations:

1. Hedonic values can contain errors from unobserved housing and land variables not included in the original study.
2. Additionally, using average values for an entire county leads to valuation errors because housing values will be affected differently depending on proximity to the orchards and specialty crops.