This paper examines the impact of fertilizer agrichemicals in water on infant and child health
using data on water quality combined with data on the health outcomes of infants and
children from the 1992-93, 1998-99, and 2005-06 Demographic and Health Surveys of India.
Because fertilizers are applied at specific times in the growing season, the concentrations of
agrichemicals in water vary seasonally and by cropped area as some Indian states plant
predominantly summer crops while others plant winter crops. Our identification strategy
exploits the differing timing of the planting seasons across regions and differing seasonal
prenatal exposure to agrichemicals to identify the impact of agrichemical contamination on
various measures of child health. The results indicate that children exposed to higher
concentrations of agrichemicals during their first month experience worse health outcomes
on a variety of measures (infant mortality, neo-natal mortality, height-for-age z scores and
weight-for-age z-scores). Disaggregated runs reveal that effects are largest amongst the
most vulnerable groups – children of uneducated poor women living in rural India.