{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/105585"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/105585","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"Three essays on agriculture, environment and human capital formation in India","abstract":"This dissertation present three studies related to environmental factors that may help explain early life mortality outcomes, household consumption decisions during childhood that could drive human capital development in later life, and potential market failures that affect farmers' returns in rural agricultural markets. The setting for all three studies is India where indicators of health and human development remain low, particularly in rural areas where majority of the households rely on agriculture as a primary source of livelihood. In chapter two, I analyze the impact of exposure to air pollution on risk of early childhood mortality. I exploit variation in the incidence of agricultural fires used by farmers combined with changes in wind direction to estimate the causal impact of air pollution on infant mortality at a countrywide scale. I find that \\emph{in-utero} pollution exposure increases infant mortality risk by more than six percent, with the mortality burden being higher among rural households and the urban poor. In chapter three, I examine whether informal contracts provide incentives for improving product quality in agricultural markets. Using a novel field experiment, we show that farmers receive only \\$0.80 for a potential \\$1 payoff for improved grain quality. However, we also find that social connections between a farmer and a trader improve the farmer’s payoff for quality suggesting that informal, long-term relational contracts can provide incentives for investing in product quality. Finally, in chapter four, I examine the unintended consequences of regulating addictive consumption on intergenerational human capital transmission using evidence from alcohol prohibition laws in India. I use the variation in “partial” alcohol bans that prohibited sale and consumption of cheaper varieties of alcohol across states in India. I show that households exposed to these partial alcohol bans shift consumption expenditure towards costlier alcohol and reduce private investment on health and education of children. In the long term, this results in an average reduction in the years of schooling among children who were exposed to these bans of more than four percent compared to the sample mean.","abstract_html":"This dissertation present three studies related to environmental factors that may help explain early life mortality outcomes, household consumption decisions during childhood that could drive human capital development in later life, and potential market failures that affect farmers' returns in rural agricultural markets. The setting for all three studies is India where indicators of health and human development remain low, particularly in rural areas where majority of the households rely on agriculture as a primary source of livelihood. In chapter two, I analyze the impact of exposure to air pollution on risk of early childhood mortality. I exploit variation in the incidence of agricultural fires used by farmers combined with changes in wind direction to estimate the causal impact of air pollution on infant mortality at a countrywide scale. I find that \\emph{in-utero} pollution exposure increases infant mortality risk by more than six percent, with the mortality burden being higher among rural households and the urban poor. In chapter three, I examine whether informal contracts provide incentives for improving product quality in agricultural markets. Using a novel field experiment, we show that farmers receive only \\$0.80 for a potential \\$1 payoff for improved grain quality. However, we also find that social connections between a farmer and a trader improve the farmer’s payoff for quality suggesting that informal, long-term relational contracts can provide incentives for investing in product quality. Finally, in chapter four, I examine the unintended consequences of regulating addictive consumption on intergenerational human capital transmission using evidence from alcohol prohibition laws in India. I use the variation in “partial” alcohol bans that prohibited sale and consumption of cheaper varieties of alcohol across states in India. I show that households exposed to these partial alcohol bans shift consumption expenditure towards costlier alcohol and reduce private investment on health and education of children. In the long term, this results in an average reduction in the years of schooling among children who were exposed to these bans of more than four percent compared to the sample mean.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Pullabhotla, Hemant Kumar"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":"Agricultural & Applied Econ","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Baylis, Kathy","Winter-Nelson, Alex","Crost, Benjamin","Baez, Javier"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2019,"date_issued":"2019-11-26T20:33:35Z","date_published":"2019-11-26T20:33:35Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:44Z","subjects":["Air pollution","Development","Human Capital","Alcohol Prohibition","Agricultural markets"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2019 Hemant Pullabhotla"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105585","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Baylis, Kathy","Winter-Nelson, Alex","Crost, Benjamin","Baez, Javier"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Pullabhotla, Hemant Kumar"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2019-11-26T20:33:35Z","2019-05-31","2019-08"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Agricultural & Applied Econ"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Air pollution","Development","Human Capital","Alcohol Prohibition","Agricultural markets"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2019 Hemant Pullabhotla"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105585"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["This dissertation present three studies related to environmental factors that may help explain early life mortality outcomes, household consumption decisions during childhood that could drive human capital development in later life, and potential market failures that affect farmers' returns in rural agricultural markets. The setting for all three studies is India where indicators of health and human development remain low, particularly in rural areas where majority of the households rely on agriculture as a primary source of livelihood. In chapter two, I analyze the impact of exposure to air pollution on risk of early childhood mortality. I exploit variation in the incidence of agricultural fires used by farmers combined with changes in wind direction to estimate the causal impact of air pollution on infant mortality at a countrywide scale. I find that \\emph{in-utero} pollution exposure increases infant mortality risk by more than six percent, with the mortality burden being higher among rural households and the urban poor. In chapter three, I examine whether informal contracts provide incentives for improving product quality in agricultural markets. Using a novel field experiment, we show that farmers receive only \\$0.80 for a potential \\$1 payoff for improved grain quality. However, we also find that social connections between a farmer and a trader improve the farmer’s payoff for quality suggesting that informal, long-term relational contracts can provide incentives for investing in product quality. Finally, in chapter four, I examine the unintended consequences of regulating addictive consumption on intergenerational human capital transmission using evidence from alcohol prohibition laws in India. I use the variation in “partial” alcohol bans that prohibited sale and consumption of cheaper varieties of alcohol across states in India. I show that households exposed to these partial alcohol bans shift consumption expenditure towards costlier alcohol and reduce private investment on health and education of children. In the long term, this results in an average reduction in the years of schooling among children who were exposed to these bans of more than four percent compared to the sample mean.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2019-11-26 without embargo terms","The student, Hemant Pullabhotla, accepted the attached license on 2019-05-28 at 22:45.","The student, Hemant Pullabhotla, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2019-05-28 at 22:55.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2019-05-31 at 11:50.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #14000 on 2019-11-26 at 12:49:21","Made available in DSpace on 2019-11-26T20:33:35Z (GMT). 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The setting for all three studies is India where indicators of health and human development remain low, particularly in rural areas where majority of the households rely on agriculture as a primary source of livelihood. In chapter two, I analyze the impact of exposure to air pollution on risk of early childhood mortality. I exploit variation in the incidence of agricultural fires used by farmers combined with changes in wind direction to estimate the causal impact of air pollution on infant mortality at a countrywide scale. I find that \\emph{in-utero} pollution exposure increases infant mortality risk by more than six percent, with the mortality burden being higher among rural households and the urban poor. In chapter three, I examine whether informal contracts provide incentives for improving product quality in agricultural markets. Using a novel field experiment, we show that farmers receive only \\$0.80 for a potential \\$1 payoff for improved grain quality. However, we also find that social connections between a farmer and a trader improve the farmer’s payoff for quality suggesting that informal, long-term relational contracts can provide incentives for investing in product quality. Finally, in chapter four, I examine the unintended consequences of regulating addictive consumption on intergenerational human capital transmission using evidence from alcohol prohibition laws in India. I use the variation in “partial” alcohol bans that prohibited sale and consumption of cheaper varieties of alcohol across states in India. I show that households exposed to these partial alcohol bans shift consumption expenditure towards costlier alcohol and reduce private investment on health and education of children. In the long term, this results in an average reduction in the years of schooling among children who were exposed to these bans of more than four percent compared to the sample mean.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2019-11-26 without embargo terms","The student, Hemant Pullabhotla, accepted the attached license on 2019-05-28 at 22:45.","The student, Hemant Pullabhotla, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2019-05-28 at 22:55.","This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2019-05-31 at 11:50.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #14000 on 2019-11-26 at 12:49:21","Made available in DSpace on 2019-11-26T20:33:35Z (GMT). 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