Fertility and rural electrification in Bangladesh

Fujii Tomoki and Abu Shonchoy

No 521, IDE Discussion Papers from Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO)

Abstract: We use a panel dataset from Bangladesh to examine the relationship between fertility and the adoption of electricity with the latter instrumented by infrastructure development and the quality of service delivery. We find that the adoption of electricity reduces fertility, and this impact is more pronounced when the household already has two or more children. This observation can be explained by a simple household model of time use, in which adoption of electricity affects only the optimal number of children but not necessarily current fertility behavior if the optimal number has not yet been reached.

Keywords: Bangladesh; Fertility; Family planning; Electric power; Rural societies; Infrastructure; Time use; Panel data; Ordered probit regression (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J13 O20 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr and nep-dev
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Published in IDE Discussion Paper = IDE Discussion Paper, No. 521. 2015-03-01

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https://ir.ide.go.jp/record/37657/files/IDP000521_001.pdf First version, 2015 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Fertility and rural electrification in Bangladesh (2020)
Working Paper: Fertility and Rural Electrification in Bangladesh (2017)
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