The review of valuation methods conducted by the FOREST EUROPE Expert Group was devoted especially to methods of economic valuation of ecosystem services. Economic valuation of forest ecosystem services usually relies on one of the three above mentioned approaches. Some of the respective methods rely on the revealed behaviour of the users for these services i.e. revealed preference approaches, while others use surveys and directly ask users about their willingness to pay for certain services i.e. stated preference approaches. The advantage of revealed preference approach is that it is based on actually observed behaviour (e.g. purchases of certain services). The value of forest services in question can be either derived directly (e.g. from market prices) or indirectly from surrogate markets that have a relationship with the forest service of interest. However, the applicability of these methods is limited only to a few forest ecosystem services (e.g. recreation, tourism and amenities).
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