Willingness to Pay for improving Weather forecast service in Korea: A Choice Experiment Study

The Korea Meteorology Administration (KMA) provides weather forecasts, warnings for the public. KMA launched the Digital Forecast Service (DFS) as the result of weather forecast investment in October, 2008. Funds are needed for a continuous improvement of weather forecast service. Owing to the budget constraint, it is necessary to assess whether an investment is proper or not and to analyze the benefits of weather forecast service investment based on households' willingness to pay. This study attempts to apply a choice experiment (CE) for assessing weather forecast service investment in Korea by considering various attributes. We consider the trade-offs between a price and attributes of weather forecast service improvement (frequency of one-day and multiday forecast updates and accuracy of them) and derive the marginal WTP (MWTP) estimates for each attribute. The results reveal that the Korean public puts a value on the accuracy of one-day and multiday forecasts, the frequency of them, respectively. This study is expected to provide policy-makers with useful information for evaluating and planning policies related to weather forecast services investment.