Estimating Demand When Turning a Public Bad into an Impure Public Good

Aquatic vegetation is a public bad that grows in common property freshwater resources and provides the habitat for snails that host schistosomes that infect, and reinfect, rural villagers in our northern Senegal study sites. We will estimate demand for compost and animal feed made from aquatic vegetation in northern Senegal, with and without information about the production method's public good benefit in controlling the infectious disease schistosomiasis. Our objective is to quantify individuals' willingness to pay (WTP) for as-yet-nonmarketed impure public goods that bundle a public good - reduced infectious disease exposure - with a private good - in this case, the agricultural inputs compost and livestock feed - and to unpack these distinct sources of valuation of each good.