IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unm/unumer/2017020.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Role of WASH and Agency in Health: A study of isolated rural communities in Nilgiris and Jalpaiguri

Author

Listed:
  • Ramani, Shyama V.

    (UNU-MERIT, and School of Business and Economics, Maastricht University)

Abstract

The objective of the Swachh Bharath Mission (SBM) or Clean India Mission of the Indian Government is to eliminate open defecation in India through installation of toilets and triggering of behavioural change by 2019. The problem is most daunting in isolated communities with poor WASH infrastructure and local agencies with scarce resources. In India, tribal communities, living near forests and along mountain ranges are among the most isolated, which means that the study of the impact of WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene behaviour) and the effectiveness of local agencies responsible for public hygiene in such communities is pertinent for our research query. Thus, this working paper presents the results of a study of 20 villages located in two districts, Nilgiris and Jalpaiguri, in two distinct Indian states - Tamil Nadu and West Bengal respectively. The central research question is: What is the role of WASH infrastructure and capabilities and local agencies in containing the incidence of excreta related diseases in isolated rural Indian communities? A novel multi-level model is developed and estimated and further validated through focus research groups. It confirms that disease incidence is jointly determined by the quantity as well as the quality of WASH. The role of agency seems to matter more at village level rather than at the household level.

Suggested Citation

  • Ramani, Shyama V., 2017. "Role of WASH and Agency in Health: A study of isolated rural communities in Nilgiris and Jalpaiguri," MERIT Working Papers 2017-020, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    • Handle: RePEc:unm:unumer:2017020
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.merit.unu.edu/publications/wppdf/2017/wp2017-020.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Kuschminder, Katie & Koser, Khalid, 2017. "The role of migration-specific and migration-relevant policies in migrant decision-making in transit," MERIT Working Papers 2017-022, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    2. Alexis Habiyaremye, 2017. "Estimating the impact of sericulture adoption on farmer income in Rwanda: an application of propensity score matching," Agrekon, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(3), pages 296-311, July.
    3. Bose, Debasree & Dutta, Arijita, 2017. "Regional analysis of sanitation performance in India," MERIT Working Papers 2017-023, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    WASH; Sanitation; Health; Public Health; Health Policy; Inequality; Economic development; Social Innovation; India;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior
    • I15 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Economic Development
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • O35 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Social Innovation

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:unm:unumer:2017020. 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: Ad Notten (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/meritnl.html .

    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.