Crop or stubble burning is common practice in India; it produces smoke which increases particulate matter (PM) in the affected area. Prachi Singh discussed her paper that examines the impact of such fire events during the first three months after birth of a child on various child health outcomes by combining detailed satellite data collected by NASA on fire incidents with National Family Health Survey IV. She has used a fixed effects regression model to identify the effect of fire events on child health outcomes. Her results show that children who were exposed to greater number of fire incidents in their first three months after birth have lower height-for-age and lower weight-for-age.

Speaker profile: Prachi Singh earned her Ph.D. in Economics at Indian Institute of Statistics (ISI).

This event was off-the-record.