the economic valuation of organic products, application of stated preferences approach (case study: organic tomatoes of dasht-e marghab)

in recent years, increased public awareness of the detriment of consuming common products, during whose production chemical fertilizers and pesticides are used, on the one hand, and also the benefits of organic farming for health and environment, on the other hand, have caused an increase in the demand for organic products. due to the yield loss in product in organic farming because of the lack of the use of chemicals, the estimation of the consumers' willingness to pay, for surveying the market of these products, and estimating the total economic value of the desired product, seem necessary. in this study, 400 questionnaires were collected from the residents of dasht-e marghab county, through random sampling method, in 2015. the logit model is used in this study in order to achieve the desired results. the obtained results show that 70.25% of consumers are willing to pay more to buy organic tomatoes than ordinary tomatoes. also variables, such as: age, sex, income, education, the weekly consumption of non-organic tomatoes, the environmental index, health index, and the offer price, have a significant effect on the likelihood of consumers' willingness to pay. finally, it was determined that consumers are willing to buy each kilogram of organic tomatoes for 34,700 rials, and the total economic value of organic tomatoes in the region, considering the yield loss in transition from conventional farming to organic farming, due to the yield loss proceeding from the change in farming system, was determined over 487 billion rials. also, according to the cultivated area, the economic value per hectare of tomatoes (organic) in a hypothetical market, formed from the demand side, was estimated equal to 1.6 billion rials.