We investigate the effects of severe drought shocks in Tunisia’s agricultural sector during the period 2000-2019. Using labour force surveys aligned with granular weather data, we calculate Standardized Potential Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) to detect moderate-to-severe drought shocks occurred at the governorate level and frame the analysis in a staggered difference-in-differences setting with repeated negative events. We find that shocked areas experience a maximum of 7.4 to 10.6 percentage point drop in agricultural employment compared to the untreated or not-yet-treated governorates. We observe a contemporaneous opposite dynamic in the employment rate of low-skill and less climate-sensitive sectors, as well as a modest and transient increase in unemployment. The effects are largely heterogeneous across workers' groups, with women, young individuals and low-educated workers paying the highest toll. Urban non-agricultural workers are temporarily crowded out from the labour market due to the increase in the informal labour supply.
When the Rain Stops Falling: Effects of Droughts on the Tunisian Labour Market / Alfani, Federica; Palma, Alessandro; Pallante, Giacomo; Talhaoui, Abdelkader. - In: JOURNAL OF AFRICAN ECONOMIES. - ISSN 1464-3723. - 2024:(2024). [10.1093/jae/ejae010]
When the Rain Stops Falling: Effects of Droughts on the Tunisian Labour Market
Pallante, GiacomoPenultimo
;
2024-01-01
Abstract
We investigate the effects of severe drought shocks in Tunisia’s agricultural sector during the period 2000-2019. Using labour force surveys aligned with granular weather data, we calculate Standardized Potential Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) to detect moderate-to-severe drought shocks occurred at the governorate level and frame the analysis in a staggered difference-in-differences setting with repeated negative events. We find that shocked areas experience a maximum of 7.4 to 10.6 percentage point drop in agricultural employment compared to the untreated or not-yet-treated governorates. We observe a contemporaneous opposite dynamic in the employment rate of low-skill and less climate-sensitive sectors, as well as a modest and transient increase in unemployment. The effects are largely heterogeneous across workers' groups, with women, young individuals and low-educated workers paying the highest toll. Urban non-agricultural workers are temporarily crowded out from the labour market due to the increase in the informal labour supply.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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