Natural Science Research Useful to the Economist

the preceding chapters, we have emphasized the necessity of knowing the influence of various physical and biological factors upon some ecosystem variable of interest if economic methods fo assessing the benefits 1? of controlling acid precipitation are to be applied.— At the same time, we have formulated several analytical and empirical characterizations of the acid precipitation problem intended to be helpful in deciding which of these relations are likely to be worthy of more immediate research attention. For example, our discussion of nonconvexities and irreversibilities in Chapter 111 leads to the conclusion that the very early stages of ecosystem acidification often have the greatest economic consequences. The devotion of research resources to understandings of the behaviors of already highly acidified systems may, therefore, yield little information that is economically important. However, before abandoning or greatly reducing research on already highly acidified systems, it is obviously important to establish accurately the temporal and spatial frequencies of the nonconvexity and irreversibility issues. If these issues appear with considerable frequency, then an allocation of research resources that accords with the ordering of current annual sectoral control benefits estimated in the “first exercise” of Chapter 11 might well be mistaken. The economic import of a unit of information on indirect ecosystem effects could presently be much higher than would more information on materials damages or direct agricultural effects.