IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/endeec/v4y1999i04p565-581_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Avoiding health risks from drinking water in Moscow: An empirical analysis

Author

Listed:
  • LARSON, BRUCE A.
  • GNEDENKO, EKATERINA D.

Abstract

Casual observation suggests that many households in Moscow boil water, settle water in pans for some periods (e.g., overnight) before consuming, filter water, and buy bottled water. To date, there has been little empirical analysis of such avoidance behavior. Based on a recently completed survey of 615 households in Moscow, this paper investigates the types and amounts of avoidance measures that are used by households in Moscow to adjust drinking water quality. Survey results show that this is clearly the case: over 88 per cent of the sample boil water regularly due to concerns about water quality; 23 per cent filter water regularly; over 30 per cent settle water regularly; and about 13 per cent buy bottled water regularly. On the other hand, residents are generally content with their cold water supply and quality of delivery. Based on a microeconomic model of household avoidance behavior, logit regression results show how avoidance decisions relate to income, opinions of water quality, and location in the city. It is expected that this analysis from Moscow can also be used as a guide for future studies in other cities in Russia to evaluate opinions of quality, avoidance measures, and citizens' willingness to support public infrastructure projects designed to improve water supply.

Suggested Citation

  • Larson, Bruce A. & Gnedenko, Ekaterina D., 1999. "Avoiding health risks from drinking water in Moscow: An empirical analysis," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(4), pages 565-581, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:endeec:v:4:y:1999:i:04:p:565-581_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1355770X99000339/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Bruno Lanz & Allan Provins, 2014. "The demand for tap water quality: Survey evidence on water hardness and aesthetic quality," CIES Research Paper series 23-2014, Centre for International Environmental Studies, The Graduate Institute.
    2. Totoum, Armand & Fouéka Tagne, Sostaine Romuald & Ngouhouo Poufoun, Jonas, 2018. "Determinants of the avoidance behaviour of households to cope with unsafe drinking water: case study of Douala and Yaoundé in Cameroon," Review of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Studies, Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), vol. 99(2), April.
    3. Pape, Andreas Duus & Seo, Misuk, 2015. "Reports of Water Quality Violations Induce Consumers to Buy Bottled Water," Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, Northeastern Agricultural and Resource Economics Association, vol. 44(1), pages 1-16, April.
    4. Irina Klytchnikova & Michael Lokshin, 2009. "Measuring Welfare Gains from Better Quality Infrastructure," Journal of Infrastructure Development, India Development Foundation, vol. 1(2), pages 87-109, December.
    5. Jyotsna Jalan & E. Somanathan & Saraswata Choudhuri, "undated". "Awareness and the Demand for Environmental Quality: Drinking Water in Urban India," Working papers 32, The South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics.
    6. Lanz, Bruno & Provins, Allan, 2017. "Using averting expenditures to estimate the demand for public goods: Combining objective and perceived quality," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 20-35.
    7. Anna-Maria Aksan & William F. Vásquez, 2019. "Quality Perceptions and Water Treatment Behavior at the Household Level," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 5(03), pages 1-33, July.
    8. Miguel A. García-Rubio & Cecilia Tortajada & Francisco González-Gómez, 2016. "Privatising Water Utilities and User Perception of Tap Water Quality: Evidence from Spanish Urban Water Services," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 30(1), pages 315-329, January.
    9. Patrick Lloyd-Smith & Craig Schram & Wiktor Adamowicz & Diane Dupont, 2018. "Endogeneity of Risk Perceptions in Averting Behavior Models," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 69(2), pages 217-246, February.
    10. Satarupa Chakravarty & Sukanya Das & Saudamini Das, 2021. "Unreliable Public Water Supply and Coping Mechanisms of Low-Income Households in Delhi," IEG Working Papers 448, Institute of Economic Growth.
    11. Sean Lyons & Joe O’Doherty & Richard Tol, 2010. "Determinants of Water Connection Type and Ownership of Water-Using Appliances in Ireland," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 24(12), pages 2853-2867, September.
    12. Rajapakshe, Sisira & Termansen, Mette & Paavola, Jouni, 2022. "Valuing Water Service Improvements through Revealed Preference: Averting Behaviour Method," MPRA Paper 115623, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Das, Saudamini & Nepal, Mani & Rai, Rajesh K. & Bhatta, Laxmi D. & Khadayat, Madan S., 2019. "Valuing water provisioning service of Broadleaf and Chir Pine forests in the Himalayan region," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 40-51.
    14. Jessoe, Katrina, 2013. "Improved source, improved quality? Demand for drinking water quality in rural India," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 66(3), pages 460-475.
    15. Tan-Soo, Jie-Sheng & Qin, Ping & Zhang, Xiao-Bing, 2018. "Power stations emissions externalities from avoidance behaviors towards air pollution: Evidence from Beijing," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 336-345.
    16. William F. Vásquez & Pallab Mozumder & Dina Franceschi, 2015. "Water Quality, Household Perceptions and Averting Behavior: Evidence from Nicaragua," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 1(04), pages 1-21, December.
    17. Samrat B. Kunwar & Alok K. Bohara, 2019. "Water Quality Avoidance Behavior: Bridging the Gap between Perception and Reality," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 6(02), pages 1-33, November.
    18. Totouom Fotue Luc Armand & Sostaine Romuald Foueka Tagne & Jonas Ngouhouo Poufoun, 2018. "Demand For Improved Water Quality: An Analysis of Averting Actions by Cameroonian Households," Working Papers 345, African Economic Research Consortium, Research Department.
    19. repec:gii:ciesrp:cies_rp_36rev is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Marta Suárez-Varela & Ariel Dinar, 2020. "The Role of Curtailment Versus Efficiency on Spillovers Among Pro-Environmental Behaviors: Evidence from Two Towns in Granada, Spain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-24, January.
    21. Armand, Totouom Fotue Luc, 2016. "Determinants of household avoidance behavior to cope with unsafe drinking water: case study of Cameroon," 2016 Fifth International Conference, September 23-26, 2016, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia 249333, African Association of Agricultural Economists (AAAE).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:endeec:v:4:y:1999:i:04:p:565-581_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/ede .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.