Does accessibility to water and sanitation improves household wellbeing in India?

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the potential linkages between access to water and sanitation with household wellbeing in India. A few studies have been carried out on the expected benefits of investments in water and sanitation in spite of the fact that effect of investment in water and sanitation has a huge impact on overall performance of household in terms of health, education, employment, etc. This study uses data from Indian Human Development Surveys (IHDSs) collected by the University of Maryland and the National Council of Applied Economic Research in 2004–05 and 2011–12. Econometric analysis has been done to examine the relationship between access to water and sanitation and its consequential impact on the overall welfare of households. The main hypothesis is that an improvement in the accessibility of water and sanitation sources increases the overall standard of living with the assumptions that an improvement in the accessibility of water and sanitation sources reduces illness among household members, which also, in turn, tends to increase overall standard of living. The data indicated that there was no significant improvement in access to water sources in India from 2004–05 to 2011–12. Around 53% of the households surveyed used open fields as toilets in 2004–05, and this proportion only slightly decreased (44.72%) by 2011–12. While comparing the overall standard of living, about 38.5% respondents believe they became better off between two periods (from 2004–05 to 2011–12) while around 52% respondent feels there was no significant improvement in their standard of living. Ordered log it regression analyses were carried out to establish links between water and sanitation access and changes in household welfare. There is a positive relationship between improvements in households ’sources of water and sanitation and improvements in households ’(self-reported) overall welfare. In other words, households experiencing an improvement in their source of water supply and sanitation were more likely to report an improvement in their overall standard of living, and less likely to report deterioration