Resource purchasing funds have become a major tool for environmental protection and resource conservation. Existing conservation funds do not use identical strategies for targeting purchases, which may be determined by both political and economic considerations. This paper compares the effects of alternative targeting strategies in consumer surplus, producer surplus, and environmental benefits. It shows that the performance of a purchasing strategy depends on the variability of a correlation between productivity and environmental benefits of resources, and that ignoring the output price effect of purchasing funds may have severe consequences.