Arsenic Mitigation in Bangladesh: A Household Labor Market Approach

A major environmental tragedy of modern times is the widespread arsenic contamination of shallow drinking water wells in rural Bangladesh which went unrecognized for years. Large numbers of people are now starting to show a range of symptoms long associated with chronic arsenic exposure. Rural families in Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world, face financial risks from major illness both from the cost of medical care and from the loss of income associated with reduced labor supply and productivity. In this article, we look at the impacts of arsenic contamination on both the overall level of hours worked and the distribution of these hours within households. Using a large sample of rural households matched to arsenic exposure, we find (i) overall household labor supply is 8% smaller due to arsenic exposure and (ii) intrahousehold reallocation of work between males and females is used to self-insure against the risk induced by arsenic exposure. Carson is professor at the Department of Economics, University of California, San Diego. Koundouri is assistant professor at the Department of International and European Economic Studies, Athens University of Economics and Business. Nauges is senior researcher at the French Institute for Research in Agriculture (INRA) and Toulouse School of Economics. The arsenic problem in Bangladesh Until about 30 years ago Bangladesh households relied almost exclusively on surface water for drinking purposes. That source however contained waterborne pathogens causing life-threatening diseases that would have required expensive and complicated treatments to render it safe. Encouraged by international aid agencies, millions of tube wells were installed throughout the country making the groundwater resources of the country the main source of drinking water. Chronic arsenic poisoning attributed to groundwater ingestion was first diagnosed in Bangladesh in 1993. Direct confirmation that an enormous number of tube wells were contaminated by arsenic came when the British Geological Survey and the Department of Public Health Engineering of Bangladesh (2001) carried out a survey of 3,500 tube wells from 61 out of 64 districts of Bangladesh between 1998 and 1999. The results show that 27 percent of the tube wells less than 150 metres deep exceeded the Bangladesh standard for arsenic in drinking water of 50 μg/litre. Using the World Health Organisation (WHO) guideline value of 10 μg/litre as the reference level the figure rises to 46 percent. It is now believed that around 35 million people are exposed to an arsenic concentration in drinking water exceeding 50 μg/litre, whilst 57 million people are exposed to concentration levels exceeding 10 μg/litre. Chronic exposure to arsenic in drinking water has often been associated with the development of skin cancers and internal cancers especially of the bladder, liver and lungs and a wide variety of other health conditions such as diabetes, respiratory problems, cardiovascular diseases, hyperpigmentation, hypopigmentation and keratoses – a condition in which painful nodules grow on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet (Chowdhury et al. 2000). The latency period for arsenic-linked cancers is estimated to be approximately twenty years and depending on concentrations the time delay from first exposure to the manifestation of arsenic-related skin disorders is about 10 years. While arsenic-related health problems in Bangladesh have long received considerable attention (e.g., Smith, Lingas, and Rahman 2000), implications for the labor supply have not been examined. In this article, we look at the impacts of arsenic contamination on both the overall