Search

Mexico reported an access rate to piped water of 93.7% and an affordability rate of 0.9%. According to the Millennium Development Objectives, these values suggest that the government is complying w...

This study analysed the impact of a series of socioeconomic variables on the efficiency of production processes used by different economic units belonging to the manufacturing industry in a hydrolo...

The manufacturing industry in Mexico is concentrated in the central and northern region of the country, which is characterized by high water stress. This condition foreshadows a complicated future ...

This article identifies the technological characteristics of the paper manufacturing industry in the Valley of Mexican Basin (VMB)—a densely populated region characterized by absolute water scarcity—in order to quantify the intensity with which water is used. The method consisted of modeling the paper industry’s technology estimating Cobb-Douglas production functions at two moments in time. The comparison of both functions makes it possible to identify water saving technologies during this period, and to evaluate whether the industry has made adjustments to deal with water restrictions. The data is obtained from the Economic Censuses of the National Institute of Statistics Geography and Informatics 2009 and 2014. While our work must be considered preliminary owing to the somewhat irregular nature of the data, certain clear conclusions do stand out. The paper industry located in the VMB has drastically reduced its water usage during the period of time analyzed. This is explained by the adoption of water saving technologies in the industry. In the process, an increase in capital is the main variable to explain such a technical change. This is expressed in the manner in which water and capital inputs appear to be highly suitable substitutes in paper manufacturing.

Objetivo: Estimar la disponibilidad a pagar (DAP) por recurrir a una cita odontológica, sabiendo que la clínica implementó medidas de bioseguridad para evitar el contagio de COVID-19; y si ésta varía si se ofrece a los encuestados mayor información sobre dichas medidas y sus costos por implementar. Material y métodos: Planteamiento de escenarios hipotéticos por medio de encuestas aplicadas a personas en la Ciudad de México y un análisis de prueba de medias. Resultados: Un 45% de los encuestados tendrían DAP un monto adicional por su cita, y dicho porcentaje podría aumentar hasta un 58% si se ofrece mayor información. Conclusiones: La presencia de COVID-19 tiene un profundo efecto económico en las prácticas odontológicas y los tomadores de decisión, a través de política pública, deben diseñar y poner en práctica apoyos económicas al sector salud, y el sector salud debería ofrecer mayor información sobre las ventajas de las medidas y los costos en los que incurre.

Objetivo: realizar la valoración económica del servicio ecosistémico recreativo (SER) provisto por el tiburón ballena dentro de la Bahía de La Paz, así como calcular la disponibilidad a pagar (DAP) de los usuarios del SER. Metodología: se aplicó el Método de Valoración Contingente (MVC) a través de un modelo Logit. Resultado: se calculó la utilidad económica y la DAP de los entrevistados durante la temporada de observación 2019-2020 considerando variables socioeconómicas como género, edad, escolaridad y país de origen de los encuestados, entre otras. Limitaciones: dado que el MVC realiza la pregunta de valoración contingente de manera directa, se pueden presentar algunas dificultades cuando la medición es efectuada. Esto se debe a que es una técnica que puede implicar desventajas en la veracidad de las respuestas de los entrevistados. Los sesgos que se pueden presentar con el diseño y aplicación de la encuesta fueron minimizados, sin embargo, dado el alcance del estudio, no fue posible validar sus resultados con otras técnicas de valoración económica del medio ambiente. Conclusiones: se calculó la DAP total, la del turismo nacional y la del turismo extranjero. No se encontraron diferencias significativas entre estas. La presencia del tiburón ballena en la bahía, en conjunto con los demás atractivos naturales que se encuentran en la zona, atraen anualmente a turismo extranjero proveniente de diversos países alrededor del mundo, los cuales contribuyen a la economía local.

"En el presente estudio se realiza un análisis de incidencia del subsidio al agua domiciliaria para los hogares de la Ciudad de México. Para ello se identifican los beneficiarios de las transferencias con la encuesta Hábitos de Consumo, Servicio y Calidad del Agua por Hogar en la Ciudad de México 2011, apoyada en el Censo de Población y Vivienda 2010 y la Encuesta Nacional de Ingresos y Gastos de los Hogares 2010, 2012, 2014. Por medio de un análisis de incidencia de subsidios, y el cálculo tanto del indicador del desempeño de términos de focalización y el coeficiente de concentración, los resultados indican que el subsidio no se concentra en los sectores más pobres. Considerados conjuntamente, 20 por ciento de los hogares con mayores ingresos económicos recibe alrededor de 45 por ciento del subsidio, mientras que 20 por ciento de los hogares con menores ingresos económicos concentran poco menos de 12 por ciento de los mismos (subsidio regresivo), lo que pone en evidencia la inequidad en su distribución y la dificultad de focalizarlos hacia los hogares que más los necesitan. Estos resultados dejan clara la necesidad de revisar esta política de subsidios, no sólo a nivel local, con el desafío que implica que en el proceso no se afecte a los sectores más vulnerables y por ende llegar a mejorar el bienestar de toda la sociedad."

Water is one of the most important inputs in the production process, especially for the manufacturing sector. However, at the same time, this resource can present shortage problems, mainly due to a lack of knowledge about its value. In most emerging countries, the monetary value of water used in the production process does not necessarily reflect that there is a shortage, or the costs of catchment and treatment. Thus, the real cost of water is not paid. In addition, it is vital that the various manufacturing industries consider the opportunity cost, or shadow price, of consuming water for its production processes. Therefore, this paper estimates the economic value of water (EVW) for the manufacturing industry in a water basin with shortage problems (Valley of Mexico Basin (VMB), Mexico). This is understood as the shadow price, using the concept of production elasticity with respect to water input (eW) and the value of the marginal product (ρW). To that end, we used information from 69,984 economic units surveyed in 2013, and considered one type of production function, i.e., translog. The eW was estimated at 0.061 and the ρW at US $ 19.4/m3. The ρW ranged from US $ 2.3/m3 for the wood sector to US $ 20.1/m3 for the beverage and tobacco sector, demonstrating variation in ρW by sector. The results have important implications for several areas of industrial water management, especially for water basins where this resource presents shortage problems. Any investment in new industrial water supply projects requires information on the industrial EVW. That information is also needed in order to determine how to efficiently distribute scarce water resources across sectors.

This paper estimates the economic value that national and international birdwatchers have to keep an urban wetland in this case, Xochimilco (Mexico), as a place of rest, food and/or shelter for migratory birds from North America. For this purpose, it is resorted to surveys and contingent valuation that estimates the willingness to pay (WTP) per year of these watchers. The best estimate indicates that national watchers are willing to pay approximately US $79 per year, while international, US $296. Using these estimates, it is calculated that the economic value of the bird migration environmental service for this urban wetland is located between US $2836 and US $3999 per hectare. This found value can work as an input for decision makers when faced with projects and/or policies that may face different objectives.

This article estimates the historical scenic beauty’s economic value that tourists do have to preserve a pre-Hispanic farm production system dating from XIV to XVI century to be known as chinampas (raised beds) and is located in Mexico City. Therefore, in order to do this, surveys are performed and by contingent valuation (CV), the willingness-to-pay (WTP) is estimated. The best estimation points out that tourists are willing to pay 24.4 dollars around each year, and by means of such estimation, it is estimated that the cultural service’s economic value to preserve raised beds is between US$ 3000 and US$ 3700 per hectare. Such found value must be used as another input for decision makers when dealing with projects and/or policies facing contrary purposes. The analysis is innovative in the sense that there is almost no CV literature to estimate the economic value of historical scenic beauty.

A través de un análisis financiero, se verifica que la implementación de un sistema silvopastoril es más rentable económicamente que un sistema tradicional para productores de leche en la Reserva de la Biósfera de los Tuxtlas, Veracruz, México. Aproximadamente, deben pasar cuatro años para que un sistema silvopastoril sea más rentable y entre dos a tres años para recuperar la inversión económica inicial. Aunado a ello, en el corto plazo los productores indican un aumento de sus ingresos brutos derivados de la actividad. Un sistema silvopastoril, además de incrementar la producción de bienes mercadeables como la leche, genera otros bienes y servicios ambientales mismos que son identificados en este estudio por los productores.

A 2011 survey of Mexico City’s households revealed that families prefer alternative sources of drinking water instead of relying in the city’s quality supply services. These include the purchase of bottled water, installation of filtration devices, and other means of water purification. The demand for better water quality was tested by estimating the household’s willingness to pay (WTP), using a contingency valuation (CV) experiment through an open-format questionnaire and by estimating a censored econometric (Tobit) model. The econometric study revealed that the WTP for better water quality is influenced by variables related with distrust of the water quality provided by the City and the organoleptic characteristics of the water supply, as well as spending on bottled water or water purification technologies. The average WTP surcharge for better potable water quality is US$3.1 or 4.7% of the bimonthly water bill, which is about 0.22% of the average family income in Mexico City. The percentage of WTP to income is bigger in poor families. This suggests that improving water quality is of greater importance for lower income families. Findings are consistent with previous studies that estimated the WTP for improvements in the services that supply water to households in the city. These include reduction of inefficiency and intermittency of the supply along with water quality, improve measuring water meters, reducing the obsolescence of the infrastructure and increasing adequate maintenance. Our research is the first to estimate the WTP for better water quality in Mexico City and constitutes a reference point for those that address the problem of water quality and its impact on the welfare and income of families.

Economic and population growth in Mexico City (CDMX) is the main cause of an increase in water demand against a naturally limited endowment, which increases the gap between water demand and supply. In a water scarcity environment, households are facing pressure to maintain their involvement in the city&rsquo, s only operating body, the Water System of Mexico City (SACMEX) total supply. The objective of this work is to measure the inequality in the distribution of drinking water and water subsidies between households connected to the public network of CDMX in order to generate objective indicators of the phenomenon. Having such information provides a baseline scenario of the problem and allows for the delineation of a policy covering the minimum levels of well-being in the supply of drinking water that is appropriate for the most important city in the country. The method consists of measuring inequality through continuous variables estimating the Lorenz curve, the Gini coefficient, the targeting coefficient and elasticity in water consumption and in water subsidies among households in CDMX. Data comes from a household survey carried out in 2011, Consumption Habits, Service and Quality of Water by Household in Mexico City (EHCSCA). Results show that drinking water and subsidies present a regressive distribution, benefit high-income households and, to a lesser degree, the poorest households in the city and highlight the urgency and importance for SACMEX to redefine its policy on water distribution, fees and subsidies. The present study&rsquo, s scope can contribute to the monitoring of the distribution of drinking water and of subsidies among household groups. The study justifies that the indicators employed in this work can be used and are recommended as a valuable tool in water management, especially in a dynamic environment.

En la Ciudad de México (CDMX) los hogares adoptan diversas prácticas para obtener agua de calidad bebible, como es a través de la compra de agua embotellada, el tratamiento del agua en el hogar (hervir y clorar), la instalación de filtros en la vivienda, entre otras. El comportamiento revelado mediante sus prácticas y compras indica una demanda latente por agua de mejor calidad, hecho verificado al estimar la disponibilidad a pagar (DAP) de los hogares en la CDMX por mejoras de la calidad del agua suministrada por el servicio público urbano, denominado Sistema de aguas de la Ciudad de México (SACMEX). Se ha encontrado que los hogares en promedio están dispuestos a pagar 34 pesos al bimestre (2.8 dólares/TC 12.3 año 2011) por recibir agua de calidad bebible en la llave de su vivienda, monto que representa 8.7% de su pago bimestral de agua y 0.3% de sus ingresos familiares mensuales. En simultáneo, con la estimación de un modelo econométrico, se evidencia que las variables con mayor incidencia en la DAP de los hogares son: la desconfianza hacia el SACMEX, las propiedades organolépticas del agua y el tipo de medidas preventivas para remediar la baja calidad del agua. La investigación se basa en una encuesta a hogares representativa de la CDMX y la estimación econométrica de un modelo de la DAP. La falta de información sobre las preferencias de los hogares con respecto a posibles mejoras en los servicios de agua es un impedimento importante para el mejoramiento de la oferta pública de los sistemas de abastecimiento de agua potable segura y confiable.

This paper presents the results of economic experiments run among fishermen from the Mexican and Colombian Pacific. The experimental design aims at studying behavior under uncertainty concerning the possible effects of climate change on fisheries. We find that subjects’ risk-aversion diminishes the level of catches and changes fishing practices (e.g. adopting marine reserves), provided that fishermen have ex ante information on possible climatic consequences. Furthermore, social preferences (e.g. for cooperation and reciprocity) also play an important role regarding extraction from common-pool resources. Other factors, such as income, gender and religion are also found to have some influence. These results have important implications for adaptation actions and the management of coastal fisheries.

Abalone shells and meat played and play an important role in the rich economic, social y cultural history of Baja California. Chinese and Japanese fishermen and later the consolidation of Mexican cooperatives have all fished in this region. Information obtained through surveys and oral history from three generations of abalone divers on Baja California has revealed that over time catches have decreased and the organisms fished have reduced their size. The decrease in catch size and weight described by the divers generate an approximate 70% reduction in abalone’s reproductive capacity. Resumen:Conchas y carne de abulon desempenaron y desempenan un rol importante en la rica historia economica, social y cultural de Baja California, Mexico. En la region pasaron desde pescadores chinos, japoneses hasta la consolidacion de cooperativas mexicanas. Informacion obtenida a traves de entrevistas, reportes historicos e historia oral de tres generaciones de buzos de abulon revela la reduccion tanto en capturas como en tamano del organismo. Esta reduccion genera una disminucion aproximada del 70% en la capacidad reproductiva de este molusco.