Estimated value of forest conservation of Gazu forest in Mazandaran.

Certainly, renewable resources and their status in the social and economic developments in different societies around the world have substantial and constructive role. The natural resources support economic development in any country. Therefore, in this study, the protective value of Gazu forest in Mazandaran was determined. Willingness to pay of the visitors was estimated using Contingent Valuation Method (CVM). Data was collected through questionnaires and sampling randomly from Gazu forest visitors took in spring 2013. Cochran formula, 384 samples were considered. To measure WTP of visitors, Logit model was used and the model parameters were estimated by Maximum Likelihood. The results show that the 74.71 present are willing to pay for forest conservation. The total value of Gazu forest protection is about 19 billion Rials. The results also suggested that variables such as; income, family size, age, gender, distance and level of education are meaningless but the bid variable is meaningful.