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Sanitation and externalities : evidence from early childhood health in rural India

Author

Listed:
  • Andres, Luis A.
  • Briceno, Bertha
  • Chase, Claire
  • Echenique, Juan A.

Abstract

This paper estimates two sources of benefits related to sanitation infrastructure access on early childhood health: a direct benefit a household receives when moving from open to fixed-point defecation or from unimproved sanitation to improved sanitation, and an external benefit (externality) produced by the neighborhood's access to sanitation infrastructure. The paper uses a sample of children under 48 months in rural areas of India from the Third Round of District Level Household Survey 2007-08 and finds evidence of positive and significant direct benefits and concave positive external effects for both improved sanitation and fixed-point defecation. There is a 47 percent reduction in diarrhea prevalence between children living in a household without access to improved sanitation in a village without coverage of improved sanitation and children living in a household with access to improved sanitation in a village with complete coverage. One-fourth of this benefit is due to the direct benefit leaving the rest to external gains. Finally, all the benefits from eliminating open defecation come from improved sanitation and not other sanitation solutions.

Suggested Citation

  • Andres, Luis A. & Briceno, Bertha & Chase, Claire & Echenique, Juan A., 2014. "Sanitation and externalities : evidence from early childhood health in rural India," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6737, The World Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6737
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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    Cited by:

    1. Calderon, Cesar & Serven, Luis, 2014. "Infrastructure, growth, and inequality : an overview," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7034, The World Bank.
    2. Derek Headey & Giordano Palloni, 2019. "Water, Sanitation, and Child Health: Evidence From Subnational Panel Data in 59 Countries," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(2), pages 729-752, April.
    3. Borja-Vega,Christian & Briceno,Bertha & Garcia Vicente,Fernando, 2015. "Can intense exposure to hand-washing and hygiene information campaigns affect children's socio-emotional skills ? evidence from Senegal," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7472, The World Bank.
    4. Evan Plous Kresch & Molly Lipscomb & Laura Schechter, 2020. "Externalities and Spillovers from Sanitation and Waste Management in Urban and Rural Neighborhoods," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(3), pages 395-420, September.
    5. Pritha Chatterjee & Rockli Kim & Akshay Swaminathan & Rakesh Kumar & S.V. Subramanian, 2019. "From Administrative to Political Evaluation: Estimating Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Indicators for Parliamentary Constituencies in India," Journal of Development Policy and Practice, , vol. 4(2), pages 188-212, July.
    6. Stephane Hallegatte & Mook Bangalore & Laura Bonzanigo & Marianne Fay & Tamaro Kane & Ulf Narloch & Julie Rozenberg & David Treguer & Adrien Vogt-Schilb, 2016. "Shock Waves," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 22787.
    7. Hutton, Guy & Patil, Sumeet & Kumar, Avni & Osbert, Nicolas & Odhiambo, Francis, 2020. "Comparison of the costs and benefits of the Clean India Mission," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    8. Youngmee Tiffany Jung & Ryan James Hum & Wendy Lou & Yu-Ling Cheng, 2017. "Effects of neighbourhood and household sanitation conditions on diarrhea morbidity: Systematic review and meta-analysis," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(3), pages 1-17, March.
    9. Andres,Luis Alberto & Biller,S. A. Dan & Herrera Dappe,Matias, 2014. "Infrastructure gap in South Asia : inequality of access to infrastructure services," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7033, The World Bank.

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