An accounting approach to calculate the financial value of a natural history collection of mammals in Ecuador

M. Alejandra Camacho*, Jorge Salgado M, Santiago F. Burneo

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

Biologists and economists collaborated to estimate the monetary value of the Mammal collection of the Museo de Zoología at PUCE in Quito. We analyzed the direct and indirect costs associated with collecting, preparing, and transporting mammal specimens during four 20-day trips. We determined that the average cost per specimen was $74.70. However, because the number of specimens caught in an expedition can vary, 36 expeditions varying in length between 2003 and 2016 were used, and each expedition was assigned a total cost based on the number of work days, at the baseline total cost per day obtained. The final valuation resulted in a per acquisition cost of $72.86. The total acquisition cost of the current collection is more than one million dollars. This result is a powerful argument to encourage support for research and conservation of zoological specimens.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)279-296
Number of pages18
JournalMuseum Management and Curatorship
Volume33
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - 4 May 2018

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Funding

The accounting information for this exercise was limited to four field expeditions in 2015, each lasting three weeks, as a part of the project named ‘Caracterización de la Bio-diversidad del Parque Nacional Podocarpus, Parque Nacional Sangay, Parque Nacional Yacuri y Parque Nacional Llanganates (ARCA)’ authorized by the Ecuadorian Ministerio del Ambiente under the Contrato Marco MAE-DBN-ARRGG-CM-2014-002 and funded by the Secretaría de Eduación Superior, Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación (SENESCYT). The budgets analyzed are those of the sub-project ARCA-Mamíferos 2015.

FundersFunder number
Ecuadorian Ministerio del AmbienteMAE-DBN-ARRGG-CM-2014-002
Parque Nacional Yacuri y Parque Nacional Llanganates
Secretaría de Eduación Superior

    Keywords

    • Economic value
    • financial exercise
    • mammals
    • natural history collection
    • voucher specimens

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