ABSTRACT
The cost-benefit studies done by the water-resources agencies and the apparent reverence in Congress and the executive branch for benefit-cost ratios may seem to have had a great deal to do with the growth and prosperity of water-development programs. Considerable effort could be devoted to improving the manner in which cost-benefit studies of major development projects assess environmental costs and effects, especially those relating to fish and wildlife values. Fish and wildlife planners should be willing and able to expose biased and inaccurate benefit and cost estimates employed by development agencies. A logical approach to defining projects would be to think in terms of fish and wildlife habitat: defined geographic areas of varying types and locations yielding various types of fish and wildlife related services or values. An important advantage to this approach is that habitat is a unit with direct policy relevance.
