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The Sound of Their Wings: Desert Locusts and Conflicts in Africa

Torngren Wartin, August LU (2018)
Abstract
Do negative income shocks increase conflict risk? I study the relationship between desert locust infestations and conflict in 26 African countries. Combining geolocalized data on locust swarms and bands with information on conflict events, I construct two panel datasets at spatial resolutions 0.5◦ × 0.5◦ and 0.1◦ × 0.1◦, covering the years 1997–2017. I find a negative relationship between locust infestations and conflict after accounting for cell and country-year fixed effects and month-specific polynomials of local precipitation and temperature. However, these results may reflect under-reporting by locust survey teams in areas and years of conflict. An IV strategy, drawing on insights about the weather conditions suitable for swarm and... (More)
Do negative income shocks increase conflict risk? I study the relationship between desert locust infestations and conflict in 26 African countries. Combining geolocalized data on locust swarms and bands with information on conflict events, I construct two panel datasets at spatial resolutions 0.5◦ × 0.5◦ and 0.1◦ × 0.1◦, covering the years 1997–2017. I find a negative relationship between locust infestations and conflict after accounting for cell and country-year fixed effects and month-specific polynomials of local precipitation and temperature. However, these results may reflect under-reporting by locust survey teams in areas and years of conflict. An IV strategy, drawing on insights about the weather conditions suitable for swarm and band formation, instead yields results suggesting a positive effect of locust infestations on conflict, albeit imprecisely estimated. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
supervisor
publishing date
type
Thesis
publication status
published
subject
keywords
income shocks, civil conflict, Africa, desert locusts, weather
pages
88 pages
DOI
10.2139/ssrn.4467022
language
English
LU publication?
no
id
3b2c59c6-5e32-4486-a78e-f87fa9f6280c
alternative location
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4467022
date added to LUP
2023-06-18 19:58:54
date last changed
2023-06-19 14:11:06
@misc{3b2c59c6-5e32-4486-a78e-f87fa9f6280c,
  abstract     = {{Do negative income shocks increase conflict risk? I study the relationship between desert locust infestations and conflict in 26 African countries. Combining geolocalized data on locust swarms and bands with information on conflict events, I construct two panel datasets at spatial resolutions 0.5◦ × 0.5◦ and 0.1◦ × 0.1◦, covering the years 1997–2017. I find a negative relationship between locust infestations and conflict after accounting for cell and country-year fixed effects and month-specific polynomials of local precipitation and temperature. However, these results may reflect under-reporting by locust survey teams in areas and years of conflict. An IV strategy, drawing on insights about the weather conditions suitable for swarm and band formation, instead yields results suggesting a positive effect of locust infestations on conflict, albeit imprecisely estimated.}},
  author       = {{Torngren Wartin, August}},
  keywords     = {{income shocks; civil conflict; Africa; desert locusts; weather}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{12}},
  title        = {{The Sound of Their Wings: Desert Locusts and Conflicts in Africa}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4467022}},
  doi          = {{10.2139/ssrn.4467022}},
  year         = {{2018}},
}