WORKING PAPER:
"Nature’s Shield: Deciphering Mangroves’ Influence on Property Value Dynamics in the Wake of Hurricane Irma" - (with Susana Ferreira and Yukiko Hashida)
This study explores how mangroves influence property values in flood-prone regions of coastal Lee County, Florida. By examining the directional placement of mangroves in relation to the properties and the ocean, it highlights their role in providing natural protection. The research addresses a key gap in understanding flood mitigation, particularly during major events such as Hurricane Irma, and underscores the impact of mangroves on the values of residential property.
RESEARCH IN PROGRESS:
"Let ‘Em Grow: Do Florida Coastal Property Owners Value Mangroves?" - (with Susana Ferreira and Yukiko Hashida)
This paper focuses on the nonmarket valuation of coastal mangrove forests, a critical yet undervalued component of our natural environment. Mangroves provide a multitude of ecosystem services, including protection against storm surges, erosion control, habitat for commercially valuable species, carbon sequestration, and flood mitigation. Despite their significance, these services often go unrecognized in economic planning and conservation efforts due to the absence of formal market mechanisms for their valuation. This gap in recognition and valuation poses a significant risk to the sustainability and conservation of mangrove forests. Using a hedonic pricing approach, the study estimates the marginal willingness of households to pay for changes in the mangrove forest area along the coast and examines how different attributes of mangrove affect property values.
"Shoreline Wonders: Navigating Mangroves with Geographic information system"
Mangroves are highly productive coastal forests that play a crucial role in the resilience of ecosystems, acting as natural buffers to protect human settlements and landscapes from storm surges and coastal erosion. However, a comprehensive analysis of changes in mangrove cover in the 1980s is not available. This study addresses this gap by employing a machine learning approach to map mangrove forests in southwest Florida from 1984 to 2020, using Google Earth Engine (GEE). Ground truth data was obtained from the Global Mangrove Forests Distribution, v1 (2000), and the ESA World Cover 10m (2020). Vegetation indices such as NDVI, NDMI, MNDWI, and SR, along with elevation data, were used to train models based on Decision Tree, Random Forest, and Support Vector Machine algorithms to effectively delineate mangrove areas.
CONFERENCES & PRESENTATIONS:
2024:
"Nature’s Shield: Deciphering Mangroves’ Influence on Property Value Dynamics in the Wake of Hurricane Irma" presented at Southern Agricultural Economics Association (SAEA) Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA, February 3-6, 2024.
"Nature’s Shield: Deciphering Mangroves’ Influence on Property Value Dynamics in the Wake of Hurricane Irma" presented at Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AERE) Annual Summer Conference, Washington, D.C., May 29 - 31, 2024.
2023:
"Let ‘Em Grow: Do Florida Coastal Property Owners Value Mangroves?" presented at Southern Economic Association (SEA) Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA, November 18-20, 2023.
"Let ‘Em Grow: Do Florida Coastal Property Owners Value Mangroves?" presented at Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C., July 23-25 , 2023.
"Let ‘Em Grow: Do Florida Coastal Property Owners Value Mangroves?" presented at Georgia Water Resources Conference (GWRC), Athens, GA, March 30-31, 2023.
"Shoreline Wonders: Navigating Mangroves with Geographic information system" at GIS Day Conference, UGA, Athens, GA, November 15, 2023