Title

Agricultural Fires and Infant Health

Author(s)

Tom Vogl Tom Vogl (Princeton University, BREAD, and NBER)

Marcos Rangel Marcos Rangel (Duke University and BREAD)

Abstract

Fire has long served as a tool in agriculture, but this practice's human capital consequences have proved difficult to study. Drawing on data from satellites, air monitors, and vital records, we study how smoke from sugarcane harvest fires affects infant health in the Brazilian state that produces one-fifth of the world's sugarcane. Because fires track economic activity, we exploit wind for identification, finding that late-pregnancy exposure to upwind fires decreases birth weight, gestational length, and in utero survival, but not early neonatal survival. Other fires positively predict health, highlighting the importance of disentangling pollution from economic activities that drive it.

Creation Date

2016-12

Section URL ID

Paper Number

2016December

URL

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwjFN4HbBrDBaDJza21kWlBiQWs/view

File Function

Jel

H23, I15, O13, Q53

Keyword(s)

Brazil

Suppress

false

Series

9