What is the benefit from obtaining more precise values of environmental or other public goods through surveys or other information gathering? In the value of information (VOI) problem studied here, a buyer who wishes to preserve a resource sets a price to offer a seller without knowing precisely its protection value, B, nor its value to the seller, V. The VOI from more precise information about B is important for environmental and natural resource valuation, but is typically not quantified nor compared to valuation costs. More precise environmental values reduce the frequency of two types of mistakes (protecting the resource when it should not be; and not protecting it when it should), and increases ex ante welfare. We apply our analysis to Amazon rainforest protection, focusing on the “value of perfect information,” VOPI, which, we show through simulations, typically exceeds realistic valuation costs, justifying significant valuation expenditures. VOPI also depends on the nature of buyer–seller interactions, and takes its highest value when the buyer has full concern for the seller’s outcome. Our paper proposes and prepares the base for a new, needed, field in applied welfare economics, the “benefit–cost analysis of public-good valuation studies.”

Palynologic and stratigraphic data from Laguna Tahui (42°50′S, 73°30′W) indicate cool–temperate and humid conditions there between 14,000 and 10,000 14C yr B.P., followed by warmer and drier-than-present conditions between 10,000 and 7000 14C yr B.P., and subsequent cooling and rise in precipitation over the last 5800 14C yr. The thermophilous Valdivian trees Eucryphia cordifolia and Caldcluvia paniculata reached their maximum abundance during the early Holocene warm–dry phase (10,000–7000 14C yr B.P.), followed by a rise in lake levels and reexpansion of North Patagonian conifers starting at 7000 and 5800 14C yr B.P., respectively. Variations in the stratigraphic and geographic distribution of temperate rainforests in southern Chile suggest multimillennial trends in temperature and westerly activity, which are spatially and temporally coherent with paleoclimate records from neighboring regions. Climate variability at millennial and submillennial time scales may account for the establishment and persistence of fine-scale mosaics of Valdivian and North Patagonian rainforest species in low- to mid-elevation communities since ∼5800 14C yr B.P.

In a primary dense moist evergreen forest of southern India, spatial patterns of trees ≥30 cm gbh were investigated from three contrasting 0.4-ha plots that differed in topography and amount of disturbance due to treefall. Exploratory data analysis is based on second-order neighbourhood and pair-correlation statistics used to describe the degree of clustering/regularity in patterns of all trees, and the degree of attraction/repulsion between young trees and adults. Stochastic simulations from the Markov point process models are then used to fit spatial interaction models. The results show that spatial patterns can be related to particular dynamic processes which depend on both exogenous and endogenous factors: on steep slopes disturbed by many treefalls, spatial pattern displays large clusters which can be interpreted as within-gap regeneration stages of various ages, while in areas undisturbed over a long period, interactions between young trees and adults give rise to spatial patterns consistent with substitution dynamic processes implying standing mortality rather than treefalls. Characterizing forest dynamics through spatial patterns of trees opens up the possibility of mapping structural units that might be considered as elementary functional patches of the forest mosaic.