This paper studies the effect of decentralization of management and control on forest conservation in the central Himalayas. The density of forest cover (measured with satellite images and field surveys) in forests managed by village councils is compared with that in state-managed forests and in...

Community management of forests by Van Panchayats (forest councils) to meet local needs has a long history in the Indian Central Himalayas. This essay examines the effects of village-level heterogeneity in caste and land ownership, and of female membership in the Panchayats on collective action...

A randomly selected treatment group of households in Gurgaon, India was informed whether (or not) their drinking water had tested positive for fecal contamination using a simple test costing about $0.50. Households that were not initially purifying their water, and were told that their drinking...

The demand for environmental quality is often presumed to be low in developingcountries due to poverty. Less attention has been paid to the possibility that lack of awareness about the adverse health effects of environmental pollution could also keep the demand low. We use a household survey...

We use the nation-wide policy of randomly allocating village council headships to women to identify the impact of female political leadership on the governance of projects implemented under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in India. Using primary survey data, we find more program...

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) of India mandates 1/3rd of beneficiaries to be women and equal wages across gender. We study its impact on children's educational attainment via women's increased access to labor market opportunities. Using child level panel data, and taking...

This paper assesses the effect of transition from monthly distribution of free food grains to the daily provision of free cooked meals to school children on enrollments and attendance in a rural area of India. School panel data allow a difference-in-differences estimation strategy to address...