View in EDS

Water as destiny – The long-term impacts of drought in sub-Saharan Africa.

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Title: Water as destiny – The long-term impacts of drought in sub-Saharan Africa.
Authors: Hyland, Marie1 hylandm1@tcd.ie, Russ, Jason1 jruss@worldbank.org
Source: World Development. Mar2019, Vol. 115, p30-45. 16p.
Subject Terms: *Human capital, Droughts, Water supply, Economic conditions of women, Infants, Low birth weight, Agricultural economics, Economic conditions in Africa
Geographic Terms: Sub-Saharan Africa
Abstract: Highlights • We show wide ranging evidence of the long run impacts of being born during a drought. • Early-life droughts can impact human capital accumulation. • The impacts on health and education may cascades into reduced wealth. • We show that these effects can be transmitted to the next generation. Abstract We examine the long-term impacts of drought exposure on women born in 19 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, across four decades. We find that women who were exposed to drought conditions during their early childhood are significantly less wealthy as adults. These effects are confined to women born and raised in rural households, indicating that the impacts of rainfall are felt via changes in agricultural output. In addition to lower levels of wealth, women who experience droughts in infancy also receive fewer years of formal education and, in the case of extreme drought conditions, have reduced adult heights. Our results also suggest that drought exposure in infancy can have long-term, negative impacts on women's empowerment. Finally, we also show that these impacts may be transmitted to the women's offspring, with children of affected women more likely to be born at a low birth weight (weighing <2.5 kg). To our knowledge, this represents the largest study to date both geographically and over time showing a strong relationship between early life rainfall conditions and adult outcomes, and the first to show that the impacts could span generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Copyright of World Development is the property of Pergamon Press - An Imprint of Elsevier Science and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)
Database: Education Research Complete
Description
Abstract:Highlights • We show wide ranging evidence of the long run impacts of being born during a drought. • Early-life droughts can impact human capital accumulation. • The impacts on health and education may cascades into reduced wealth. • We show that these effects can be transmitted to the next generation. Abstract We examine the long-term impacts of drought exposure on women born in 19 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, across four decades. We find that women who were exposed to drought conditions during their early childhood are significantly less wealthy as adults. These effects are confined to women born and raised in rural households, indicating that the impacts of rainfall are felt via changes in agricultural output. In addition to lower levels of wealth, women who experience droughts in infancy also receive fewer years of formal education and, in the case of extreme drought conditions, have reduced adult heights. Our results also suggest that drought exposure in infancy can have long-term, negative impacts on women's empowerment. Finally, we also show that these impacts may be transmitted to the women's offspring, with children of affected women more likely to be born at a low birth weight (weighing <2.5 kg). To our knowledge, this represents the largest study to date both geographically and over time showing a strong relationship between early life rainfall conditions and adult outcomes, and the first to show that the impacts could span generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
ISSN:0305750X
DOI:10.1016/j.worlddev.2018.11.002