O Estado de Nova Iorque é o maior centro
financeiro e comercial dos EUA, e o quarto maior centro industrial dos Estados
Unidos, perdendo apenas para a Califórnia, o Texas e Ohio. Com uma superfície de 141.296 km², quase do
tamanho do Ceará, abriga uma população de 19,4 milhões de habitantes (2010).
O sistema
de áreas protegidas reúne 180 parques
estaduais e 35 sítios históricos.
Estudo recente intitulado “Economic Benefits
of New York State Park Sytem” realizado pela ONG Parks & Trails New York, concluiu que o sistema de Parques movimenta R$
5 bilhões e gera 45 mil empregos.
Abaixo a conclusão do estudo.
New York state receives many economic and
non-economic benefits from its park system. Parks and historic sites drive
economic benefits such as employment, wages and salaries, output (sales), and
state GDP.
These economic impacts are the result of both
spending by visitors to the parks and state government spending on operations
and maintenance of the park system as well as capital improvements to the
facilities. This study has estimated the economic benefi ts of New York State
parks and has also cataloged some of the noneconomic benefi ts, such as health
benefts and ecosystem services.
Visitor spending was the largest category of
spending on parks and related goods and services. In the year from April 1,
2015 to March 31, 2016, the New York State park system received over 67 million
visits.
Visitors spent about $4 billion in visiting
the parks – this includes day visitors who paid for park entrance and parking
fees, and who spent money on food and beverages, transportation, and
merchandise. It also includes overnight visitors who had expenditures for
things like hotel rooms or camping fees and restaurant meals.
On average, day visitors spent $44.18 per
visit and overnight visitors spent in the range of $93.48 to $139.79, depending
on the park region and cost of living in the area.
The economic significance of visitor spending,
which includes both local and non-local users and is a full measure of the eff
ect on the economy, resulted in close to 45,000 jobs statewide, over $4 billion
in sales, and contributed about $2.4 billion to New York’s GDP.
These estimates were derived using an
inputoutput model, in this case IMPLAN v3 with 2014 data specific to New York State.
While economic signifi cance captures the
full eff ect of the park, the study isolates the economic impacts, which are
the net eff ect of non-local visitors. This is a subset of the economic signifi
cance and represents economic activity that arguably would not occur in the
absence of the park. Using a radius of 50 miles to separate local from nonlocal
visitors, the study found that nonlocal visits accounted for $1.6 billion in
sales, supported over 18,000 jobs throughout the state, and contributed nearly
$1 billion to state GDP.
In addition to visitor spending, economic
impacts are driven by state government spending on operations and maintenance
as well as capital improvements of the park system.
In Fiscal Year 15/16, state spending totaled
about $543 million, of which about $353 million was for O&M and $190
million for capital improvements.
These expenditures resulted in about 9,000
jobs, over $1 billion in sales, and contributed nearly $500 million to state GDP.
Combining both visitor and state government spending, the study finds that the
economic significance of the New York State park system supports 54,000 jobs,
$5 billion in sales, and $2.9 billion in state GDP. Of this, the economic
impacts – which exclude local visitors but include non-local visitors and state
government expenditures – total 27,000 jobs, $2.6 billion in sales, and $1.5
billion in state GDP.
