استفاده از تجزیه و تحلیل های اقتصاد سنجی از تمایل به پرداخت برای تحقیق کارایی اقتصادی و حقوق صاحبان سهام از خدمات آب های داخلی در بانک غرب

The paper is aimed at providing evidence on economic efficiency, and equity of distribution of domestic water services in the West Bank. The study utilizes the CVM as a means of monetizing public preferences and households’ WTP. In the CVM questionnaire, the dichotomous choice with follow-up debriefing questions format is followed by an open-ended follow-up question was undertaken. A second questionnaire survey was directed to employees from water institutions, which was mainly designed to investigate the reasons behind the full absence of private sector in the provision of water supply. The two samples were selected to ensure a representative samples in accordance with the Palestinian case. The main findings of this paper gauged the WTP with key socioeconomic variables suggested by economic theory and previous CVM studies. These results provide information on economic efficiency and equity of water distribution. The results will allow decision makers to develop new policies that can achieve more efficient and equitable domestic water services.

Water and life are closely linked. This has been known throughout history, and it is still the issue with specialists today. Water has always been scarce in Palestine, but growing populations place ever-increasing demands on water resources. Doubtless, water scarcity can be classified as a major concern in the Palestinian territories where access to, and control over, water resources is a constant issue of human survival. Winpenny (1994) revealed that scarcity growing and rising cost of water have led to the fact that water has to be allocated and managed more efficiently. The consensus, at least with economists, is that water should be dealt as an economic resource, which is necessary for improving the economic efficiency of water use. The problem of water in Palestine is not only with shortage of water supply, but also municipal water quality is classified in the WB as follows: 77.9% is good, 18.1% is fairly good, and 4% is bad (PCBS, 2007). The control of the Israeli settlements and settlers over the Palestinian land and water resources is a decisive element in a broad relationship of inequality and dependency established and promoted by the occupation over the last quarter century. The Israeli settlements have constituted no less than 72% of the WB lands (Aronson, 1998). Besides, the annually growth rate of population in the WB has been more than 3% per annum during the past decade, in parallel with the increase of building expansion, economic activities and human wants (PCBS, 2007). Added to this, the Palestinians abstract 20% of the estimated potential water resources’ underlying the WB, Israel abstracts the balance and over-draws on its agreed quantum by more than 50%. Also, Palestinian per capita access to water resources in the WB is a quarter of Israeli access and is decreasing. Therefore, some communities in the WB are restoring to unlicensed drilling to obtain drinking water (The World Bank, 2009). As a result, the PWA has obligated to increase the quantity supplied of water to fulfill the deficit of water through purchasing these quantities from the Israeli Water Company (Mekorot). The spectacular situation is that Mekorot has started to decline these purchased quantities of water since September 2000 right now, although all of these water quantities are necessary to meet the WBs’ people needs (PWA, 2005). Given this, empirical studies that can contribute to provide information on economic efficiency and equity of water distribution are necessary to be taken into consideration, which may play an important role to achieve more efficient and equitable domestic water services in the WB. The study is organized as follows. The next section reviews some of the most important contributions in the literature, in order to locate the policy aims of this paper. Section 3 describes the methods employed to analyze the data: the CVM survey, the second survey, sampling and data collection, and econometric and statistical analysis. Section 4 presents the empirical findings of the paper and discussions of these results. Finally, concluding remarks and policy implications are in Section 5.

This study is one of the few in the developing countries and the only study in Palestine that has utilized CVM for assessing the economic efficiency and equity of domestic water services. A CVM survey was utilized to obtain estimates of WTP for improved water quality and secured sufficient water supply services. Moreover, provide information on economic efficiency, and equity of water distribution in terms of both, income and location according to household's WTP. The principal methodological question addressed by the study can be answered affirmatively. The commodity and the scenario were described clearly and accurately in the CV questionnaire to achieve high quality for the CV survey, and WTP estimates for improved water supply services for current and future generations (Carson, 2000). However, this study is considered a pioneer in Palestine. This study attempted to examine economic efficiency of the municipal water supplies in the WB. According to the results of CVM, households are, voluntarily, willing to pay NIS 31.4 of each household-head per month, which is an insignificant amount in increased water costs for reliable water supplies based on the coefficients of the explanatory variables. However, the estimated WTP is likely to be insufficient to cover the cost of providing improved water quality, and secured sufficient water supplies. The abovementioned explanation concludes that efficient allocation mechanisms based on WTP with key socioeconomic variables suggested by economic theory and CV previous studies are nonexistent. The results show that the socioeconomic factors of: age, gender, urban-location, and time period have insignificant impact on WTP. The variable employment status and the family members who are gainfully employed are unlikely to be WTP. So signs of these estimated coefficients are expected to be positive and have high and important impact on WTP to be evidence that the allocation mechanisms are efficient. The outcomes conclude that the variable income and the use of water filter have positive and significant impact on WTP, since according to Tobit model (open-ended question) the marginal effect (the elasticity) of income with respect to WTP is very low, so that the level of response of WTP change with respect to income change is very low. On the other hand, according to Tobit and Logit model households who use water filters have high level of elasticity in regard to household's WTP. However, they will be ready to pay for improved water more than the others. The results also reveal that the socioeconomic factors of: The variable age, gender, education employment status, and the family members who are gainfully employed have insignificant impact on WTP. On the other hand, income and the use of water filters have positive impact on WTP. The variable consumption has negative and significant impact on WTP. The empirical results show that price of water can be increased by insignificant and inefficient amount of NIS 31.4 of each household-head per month for improved water supplies including both quality and quantity. This amount of WTP is likely to be unaffordable and inequitable for households in terms of both, income and location. On the one hand, according to Tobit model the marginal effect “elasticity” of income is 0.006 and less than 1, as a result, the percentage change of WTP with respect to income change is very low. Thus, the respondent's WTP change for income change is likely to be very low and limited. On the other hand, the products conclude that the respondents who live in the refugee camps are likely to be willing to pay more than both, rural and urban areas, although urban and rural respondents have a level of income, which is higher than the income level of the refugee camps’ respondents. This result was mainly because of: the networks and reliability of water supply in the refugee camps are bad compared with urban and rural areas. Additionally, the results of Logit model show that the elasticity of urban respondents with respect to WTP of households is elastic relatively. In contrast, the elasticity of rural respondents is inelastic relatively with respect to WTP of households, which is 0.78. Accordingly, the respondents who live in the urban areas have flexibility to the WTP for improved domestic water services more than respondents who live in the rural areas. Hence, the affordability level in regard to the household's WTP is not equitable between urban and rural areas. The author, however, concludes the allocation mechanisms of water supplies for domestic purposes in the WB are likely to be inequitable and unaffordable in terms of both, income level and location including urban areas, rural areas, and refugee camps. In Palestine, there is a full absence of the private sector participation and involvement in the water supply provision. This study seeks to investigate theses reasons behind this absence of private sector, which is necessary to enhance the economic efficiency of domestic water services. The policymakers are unlikely to be adopted a clear policy or strategy that may play an important role to leverage the private sector involvement for the investment process in the water sector. Also, proper management to communicate with private sector, or to consider the opinions of private sector are rarely found or non-existent. Moreover, water has special characteristics such as, high sunk costs, water is not a pure economic good, and water is subject to political conflicts in the region. However, the researcher recommends that decision makers should introduce motivations or promotional incentives for private sector participation. Though use of CVM, about 20-years old of WTP estimates. In Palestine, empirical studies using CVM are still very rare and limited. The survey was relatively successful in eliciting WTP values. The estimates of WTP obtained from this study are likely to be introduced an evidence about the possibility of developing a demand-driven program to expand the coverage of water needs. As a result, empirical results of CV technique are very necessary to be extended in the Palestinian territories. The appraisal of economic efficiency and equity of distribution based on use of CVM for WTP estimates, enhanced by econometric techniques is likely to be a pioneer work in Palestine. The application of these techniques for assessing agronomic and/or industrial sectors is non-existent in Palestine. Therefore, empirical studies could continue with this direction to investigate these economic issues. According to the results of the CV survey, households reveal that the pricing policy adopted in the water institutions is likely to be inequitable compared with habitants’ WTP in terms of both, income level and location of households. As a result, empirical studies for formulating pricing tariff of water based mainly on habitants’ WTP that can formulate proper water pricing policy based on WTP principle as background information are necessary to be conducted in Palestine.