Hotter years are associated with lower economic output in developing countries. We show that the effect of temperature on labor is an important part of the explanation. Using microdata from selected firms in India, we estimate reduced worker productivity and increased absenteeism on hot days. Climate control significantly mitigates productivity losses. In a national panel of Indian factories, annual plant output falls by about 2% per degree Celsius. This response appears to be driven by a reduction in the output elasticity of labor. Our estimates are large enough to explain previously observed output losses in cross-country panels.
We analyze the impact of agricultural productivity losses stemming from climate change in an economy without frictions. The first-order GDP impacts are expected to be small. But the poor have higher food budget shares and food prices will rise. How do distributional impacts diverge from the GDP impact? This is the question that is addressed. The paper considers two major sets of comparative statics: the effect of trade and the effect of economic growth. The model is calibrated to Indian data of 2009 and projections for 2030. The percentage loss of income for the landless is six times the GDP impact in a closed economy. Trade halves this effect and economic growth moderates it substantially. Despite the food price rise, nearly all farmers lose from climate change. The model is simple enough for impact channels to be transparent.
Professor C H Hanumantha Rao Past President of INSEE, Former Chairman and Honorary Professor Centre for Economic and Social Studies, Hyderabad
The Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE) has conferred the Lifetime achievements Award to Professor C H Hanumantha Rao for his outstanding contributions to the agricultural and ecological economics, development studies and to the nation and society. The award has been presented at the tenth Biennial Conference of the Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE) held at the Centre for Economic and social Studies, Hyderabad during November 6-8, 2019.
Professor M.N. Murty Professor of Economics Rtd. Institute of Economic Growth, University Enclave Delhi-110007, India.
Professor M.N. Murty is currently Fellow, South Asian Network for Development Economics and Environment (SANDEE). He was a Ford Foundation Fellow at University of Birmingham, and Research Fellow at London School of Economics, UK, Visiting Faculty, at Institute of Developing Economies, Tokyo, Japan, and Visiting Professor at National Institute of Public Finance and Policy, and TERI University, Delhi. He was a consultant for World Bank, Asian Development Bank, International Crop Research Institute (ICRISAT) and ESCAP. He specializes in Public Economics and Environmental and Resource Economics.
He taught at Delhi University, Institute of Economic Growth, Delhi, Department of Economics, University of Birmingham, U.K, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi,TERI University, Delhi, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata, Institute for Economic and Social Change, Bangalore, Madras School of Economics, Chennai, and Jadavpur University, Kolkata. He has published 10 books including 6 books in Environment and Resource Economics, four by Oxford University Press, one each by Cambridge University Press and SAGE. He has contributed a large number of research papers to national and international journals of Economics and chapters in a good number of edited books. He has undertaken a number of research projects funded by international organizations like World Bank, IDRC, Canada, ESCAP, European Commission and ICRISAT and Planning Commission, NITI Ayog, CSO, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Ministry of Communications and ICSSR of Government of India.
Prof. Ramprasad Sengupta Professor Emeritus in Economics Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi
Prof. Ramprasad Sengupta is a Professor Emeritus in Economics at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi where he was a Professor of Economics for almost four decades and has been a former Dean of its School of Social Sciences. He was Mahatma Gandhi National Fellow of the ICSSR at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta during 2016 – 2018. He was also a Professor at the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (1999 -2001) and a Visiting Professor / Scholar in a number of foreign Universities in Eurpe, North America and Japan. Besides his teaching stints, he was Advisor, Planning Commission, Government of India and a part time Independent Director on the Board of Steel Authority of India for several years.
Prof. Sengupta’s area of interest and specialization are Energy, resource and ecological / environmental economics; Quantitative policy modelling of infrastructural sectors. He has written a number of books and large number of scholarly published papers; the latest book authored by him has been Ecological limits and Economic Development : Creating Space, OUP. (2013). His forthcoming book is “Entropy Law, Sustainability and Third Industrial Revolution” to be published by the OUP.
Dr. (Mrs.) Madhu Verma Professor, Area of Environment & Developmental Economics Coordinator, Centre for Ecological Services Management at the Indian Institute of Forest Management.
Dr. (Mrs.) Madhu Vermais a biological Science graduate and MA, M.Phil & Ph.D. in Economics from Bhopal University, Bhopal. She is a Fulbright Fellow (2012), LEAD Fellow (2007) and World Bank EMCaB program’s EEOFC Grant awardee (2001) for post doc research at the UCAL(Berkeley) as Visiting Scholar and at UMASS (Amherst) & as Visiting Professor (2001). She works on Economic Valuation & Green Accounting of Ecosystems & Biodiversity, Ecosystem-Economy Modelling, Tiger & Snow Leopard Habitat Valuation, Forest- Fiscal Federalism and Payment for Ecosystem Services.
She has 35 years of enriched work experience with many national and international institutes, Ministries like MoEFCC, MoFinance, Forestry Commission & various Finance Commissions of India and United Nations bodies, World Bank and various international funding agencies and academic institute. She has travelled across the globe to more than 30 countries for work and has more than 40 publications in international and national journals, several books & Project Reports to her credit. Many of her research outcomes have greatly influenced the policies and decision making process of the government and have led to introduction of economic instruments in the system. She has contributed to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Report, TEEB and to the Global Biodiversity Assessment Report of IPBES.
She has been recognized by United Nations- REDD platform for ‘Women Working in Forests”, featured in special issue of India Today in March 2018 on Madhya Pradesh under the category of Trendsetters- Anchors of New Policies for her work on valuation of forest resources to inform policy makers & nominated as a “Human Star” for the “Day out with a Star” forum at based at Washington, DC on environmental careers.
Second September, 2016 was a dark day for most people associated with ecological and environmental movement in India. Dear V B Eswaran breathed his last on that day in New Delhi. He is survived by his good wife Girija jee, sons Somanathan and Sridharan, daughters-in-law Rohini and Divya and grand children.
For all those who have some links with research and development of policies on environment and ecological sustainability, Shri Eswaran was the doyen on this front from India. He belonged to the Gujarat cadre of Indian Administrate Services, having served there in various capacities. Later on, he moved to the Central government, and retired as Expenditure Secretary in the Ministry of Finance. But all along his career as an able administrator, his own first love was conservation of energy, development of sustainable water and forest ecosystems and making natural resources available to the poorest of the poor in the country.
His earliest entry on these front began, perhaps around 1980 when he used to visit Sukhomajri and other surrounding villages in Haryana, He very quickly understood the power of people in protecting and conserving natural resources- be they the desert lands, watersheds, forests or wildlife resources. He supported vehemently the then very active social movement of Chakriya Vikas Pranali (CVP), in Haryana and also in the present day Jharkhand. In fact, he was one of the founder members of the NGO called Society for Hill Resource Management School, with the mentor and patron Shri P R Mishra.
After his retirement from regular government services, he served the Society for Wastelands Development, as Director initially, and later on as its Chairman. He also served in various other capacities in India as Chairman of a Committee on Training on Watershed Development in India in 1994. The recommendations were then taken up by several states in India to promote the concern and actions on watershed development. He also served on a Committee set up by the honorable Supreme Court (briefly termed as NPV Committee), to recommend a methodology, methods and measures of forest values for diverting forest resources to non-forest uses. Till today, the Committee’s recommendations stand out as the guiding principle for fixing such values by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change in India.
In between, Shri Eswaran also served as Chairman of Seva Mandir in Jaipur, and as advisor to MoEF and many others on many occasions. Among many of his contributions, one distinctly recalls his works in the field of watershed development in India, forest conservation, and development of ecosystem services.
He was one of the founder members of the now famous Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE). Coming from a rich administrative background and experience, he was very instrumental in structuring the constitution of INSEE. He was very instrumental in developing INSEE’s original corpus funds, to give this organization a strong financial base, so that many academic activities could be geared up immediately. On behalf of INSEE he organized a national seminar on water resources in 2003 at New Delhi; and also helped to organize many such events. During 2002-04 he also served INSEE as its Vice-President.
The scientists, and social scientists in the field of ecology and environment cannot forget the numerous days and times working with Shri Eswaran on several occasions, walking with him, talking to him in the fields of Sukhomajri in Haryana, Chapri, Tandwa and sakhanpidi in Jharkhand. Visits to his house in Vasant Vihar house was always treasure to refresh one’s own social responsibilities to conserve natural resources in India.
An unassuming person, who helped and encouraged young scholars and administrators on the development of ecological economic thinking in India, is no more around us.
In the demise of Shri Ramaswamy R Iyer the INSEE lost a member with great diversity of interests. Not having initial education in either ecology or economics, Ramaswamy gathered deep interest in these subjects while handling issues related to the natural environment in professional life, especially during his tenure as Secretary, MoWR. As a result, he became much interested in INSEE. In Ramaswamy there was a simple person with great human values. He was able to relate to others, from young people to senior professionals. He was a person of diverse intellectual sensitivities, ranging from Karnatic music to water laws and governance.
My association with Ramaswamy started in 1989 and continued as long he was alive. The longest and most intense interaction between Ramaswamy and me was during the two years we were part of a team analysing the proposal for inter-linking of rivers in India. It was also a process of learning together to understand the unsaid implications of the links, if and when undertaken. Our last interaction was about 10 days before he passed away and related to making continued efforts on the creation of a consciousness in India on the urgent need for a holistic water policy and new laws on water. And probably in this subject area he has made the most lasting contribution through his numerous newspaper articles and several books.
In his demise, the movement for holistic water systems management in India lost an important activist. This is also true for organizations like the INSEE, where inter-disciplinary thinking constitutes the lifeline.
Narpat Singh Jodha, noted economist and President of INSEE from 2004-06 passed away on February 18th, 2020. He received his Master’s degree from the Delhi School of Economics and his PhD from the University of Rajasthan. He started his career with CAZRI Jodhpur in 1963 and worked with IARI New Delhi and various other government institutions before moving to different CGIAR Centers in India and overseas including ICRISAT Hyderabad and IITA East Africa. He worked as agricultural economist in South Asia as well as East and West Africa.
Dr. Jodha was foremost among the pioneers of work on common property resources, livelihoods and rural poverty in India. His seminal 1986 paper (published in the Economic and Political Weekly) , in particular, provided strong empirical support on the contribution of common property resources to rural livelihoods. It impacted the way in which rural poverty was theorized and written about for decades to follow. Later he moved from the arid and semi-arid tropics to focus on mountain regions as head of Mountain Farming Division at ICIMOD Kathmandu. He was briefly with the Environment Resources Division at the World Bank before rejoining ICIMOD and working on different aspects of mountain development in various capacities. Wherever he was, his work always continued to be rooted in a fieldwork based understanding of reality.
We at INSEE will remember Dr. Jodha for his lasting contributions to it as President in its early years. He shepherded it painstakingly and presided over the Conference held at IGIDR, Mumbai in 2005. He also worked closely with SANDEE, the South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics, mentoring researchers at its workshops. He was honoured as a Fellow of World Academy for Art and Science in 2001. He was also President of the International Society for the Study of the Commons (IASC) during the period 2004-06 and Conference President of the Indian Society for Agricultural Economics in 2008.
Apart from his professional accomplishments, his soft- spoken nature, his humility and his gentle spirit left a deep mark on all who were privileged to meet him. He will be remembered both as a great professional and as a genuine human.
INSEE took a decision in 2018 to honour and confer the title of Honorary INSEE Fellow on all past Presidents of INSEE subject to their prior consent. Current INSEE President will be conferred the title after demitting office subject to his/her prior consent.
Kanchan Chopra, President, INSEE (1998-2000; 2010-2012)
C.H.Hanumantha Rao, President, INSEE (2000-2002)
Gopal K. Kadekodi, President, INSEE (2002-2004)
Narpat S. Jodha, President, INSEE (2004-2006)
Jayanta Bandyopadhyay, President, INSEE (2006-2008)
Professor Joan Martinez-Alier Recipient of the 2019 Bina Agarwal Prize for Ecological Economics
The Prize Jury for the Bina Agarwal Prize for Ecological Economics consisting of Clement Tisdell (Chair), John Gowdy and E. Somanathan have unanimously decided to award the First Bina Agarwal Prize for Ecological Economics to Professor Joan Martinez-Alier for his outstanding contributions to ecological economics. The citation reads as follows:
This award is in recognition of Joan Martinez-Alier’s pioneering work integrating ecological economics with environmental justice. He co-invented the notion of the “environmentalism of the poor” that recognizes the dependence of the poor on the natural environment. He has made important practical contributions to environmental justice, including the EJ Atlas, and has provided online mapping of conflicts involving natural resources and the environment.
The Prize consists of a cash prize of Rupees Two Lakhs plus a citation which will be presented to Professor Joan Martinez-Alier at the Tenth Biennial Conference of the Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE) scheduled to be held during November 6-8, 2019 at the Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), Hyderabad.
Our hearty congratulations to Professor Joan Martinez-Alier.
