Short-Run Impacts of Reducing Water Collection Times on Time Use, Well-Being, and Education in Rural Kenya

Joseph Cook, Jane Kabubo-Mariara and Peter Kimuyu

Economic Development and Cultural Change, 2024, vol. 73, issue 1, 273 - 306

Abstract: Millions of households devote significant energy and time collecting water. To investigate the impacts of this burden, we used a free water delivery treatment to reduce collection times to zero for randomly chosen households in rural Kenya. Data on time use and well-being come from short surveys (n=9,201) completed by 222 respondents several times each day over 6 weeks. Parents reported school attendance and study times for school-aged children. Of the approximately 120 minutes per day of water collection that the treatment eliminated, respondents reallocated approximately half to other household work and half to leisure and socializing. We find no evidence of an increase in paid work on on-farm labor. Treatment caused respondents to report feeling happier. Nonexperimental, high-frequency evidence suggests that water collection is associated with having less energy and more physical pain. Treatment increased self-reported but not school-recorded attendance, and children reallocated time savings to other chores. A significant limitation is that the short treatment period of 2 weeks will miss long-run changes if water became more durably convenient and accessible.

Date: 2024
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