Saturday, May 19, 2007

Missouri: Wildlife Recreation


There are about 1.8 million individuals in Missouri each year, age 16 years and older, that view, feed, photograph, and observe wildlife. An additional 320,000 Missouri residents of ages 6 to 15 are involved in wildlife watching.

Each year, over 738,000 individuals participate in wildlife watching in Missouri away from their home. Of the total nonresidential wildlife watchers, 519,000 are state residents and 219,000 are nonresidents.

The wildlife viewing that occurs away from home involves over 4 million trips each year and wildlife watchers spend, on average, about 17 days participating in some kind of wildlife viewing. For individual activities, on average: 19 days are spent observing wildlife; 7 days photographing wildlife; and 26 days feeding wildlife. Overall, over 12.4 million days are spent viewing wildlife away from home.

Around their home, over 1.5 million Missourians participate in wildlife watching. Overall, over 106 million days are spent observing and photographing wildlife by Missourians near their homes.

The economic impact of wildlife viewing in Missouri includes $449 million in total expenditures that result in a total economic impact of over $937 million. The expenditures support 7,850 jobs and generate $200 million in earnings. The expenditures generate over $22 million in state sales taxes and a combined total of over $30 million in state sales and income taxes.

In Missouri, adults involved in wildlife viewing would fill Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City more than 23 times.

The amount of sales tax generated from fish and wildlife recreation and the forest products industry in Missouri is well over the amount of sales tax received by the Missouri Department of Conservation from the Conservation Sales Tax; in other words, conservation pays its way in Missouri.

More information is available from the 2001 National Survey report for Missouri which is available at: http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/01fhw/fhw01-mo.pdf and the economics report for Missouri which is available at: http://www.southwickassociates.com/freereports/default.aspx

A fact sheet on Missouri hunting and fishing is on page 14 of the 2005-2006 Annual Report of the Missouri Department of Conservation and is available at: http://mdc4.mdc.mo.gov/Documents/13141.pdf

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