This paper provides the first quasi-experimental evidence that pesticides adversely affect health outcomes through drinking water by linking provincial pesticide usage reports from several Chinese statistical yearbooks (1998-2011) with the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (1998-2011). First, we follow a difference-indifference in differences (DDD) framework to compare health outcomes between people who drink surface water and ground water in regions with high and low intensity of rice pesticide use before and after 2004, when China shifted from taxing agriculture to subsidizing agricultural programs. Second, we measure the downstream effect of pesticide use from upstream provinces. Our results indicate that a 10% increase in rice pesticide use unfavorably alters the index of dependence (ADL) by 2.51% and 0.33% for local and downstream residents (65 and older), respectively. This is equivalent to 168.8 and 55.89 million dollars in medical costs and offspring's human capital losses, respectively (in total, 1.92% of rice production profits). Our results are robust to a variety of robustness checks and falsification tests.
This paper provides the first quasi-experimental evidence that pesticides adversely affect health outcomes through drinking water by linking provincial pesticide usage reports from several Chinese statistical yearbooks (1998-2011) with the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (1998-2011). First, we follow a difference-indifference in differences (DDD) framework to compare health outcomes between people who drink surface water and ground water in regions with high and low intensity of rice pesticide use before and after 2004, when China shifted from taxing agriculture to subsidizing agricultural programs. Second, we measure the downstream effect of pesticide use from upstream provinces. Our results indicate that a 10% increase in rice pesticide use unfavorably alters the index of dependence (ADL) by 2.51% and 0.33% for local and downstream residents (65 and older), respectively. This is equivalent to 168.8 and 55.89 million dollars in medical costs and offspring's human capital losses, respectively (in total, 1.92% of rice production profits). Our results are robust to a variety of robustness checks and falsification tests.
This study examines the impact of air pollution from straw burning on human cognitive health in China by linking household health surveys with PM2.5 emissions derived from remote sensing data on fire activity. The identification strategy leverages the spatial dispersion of air pollutants due to exogenous wind directions. The results indicate that PM2.5 emissions from upwind straw burning have a negative impact on cognitive functions of respondents aged 55 and above, but PM2.5 emissions from downwind fires do not. The impact is transitory and caused by contemporaneous PM2.5 emissions on the day of cognitive testing. Our findings demonstrate a link from air pollution to cognitive declines and suggest that through this link, climate change could result in additional health costs by increasing the risk of wildfires.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.