Improving Health Risk Information for Sport Anglers: The Value of Information about Chemical Residues

Abstract

All states in the Great Lakes region of the United States, as well as the Canadian province of Ontario, issue some form of public health advisory to warn sport anglers about potential risks from chemical residues in fish. Most of these advisory programs tell anglers which sites have been monitored and found to contain fish with unsafe levels of chemical contaminants. Only two of the programs tell anglers which sites have been monitored and found to be safe. A contingent valuation study of Michigan anglers concludes that anglers are willing to pay little for continuation or expansion of an advisory program that does not inform them of safe sites. They are willing to pay a substantial amount, however, for a program that tells them about relatively safe sites.

Notes

² States that issue advisories in the Great Lakes region are Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York.

³ There are two sources of uncertainty about health outcomes. First, anglers are not often certain about whether particular fish are safe or unsafe to eat. Second, the health consequences of exposure to chemical residues are not known with certainty. This article focuses on uncertainty about states of contamination.

⁴ The ten program costs (in US$) used in the study were $0.40, $0.95, $1.45, $1.90, $2.85, $4.10, $5.55, $8.75, $14.50, and $41.00.

⁵ The per angler costs are based on approximately 1.2 million licensed anglers in Michigan in 1992.