The latest addition in our ICCCAD seminar series was in conjunction with the Centre for Health & Population Development (CHPD) at IUB hosted a seminar for a rising academic in the field of environmental and development economics, Dr. Jesse Anttila-Hughes. Dr. Anttila-Hughes is an assistant professor of applied econometrics at the University of San Francisco, whose work spans from the impact of environmental shocks on infant and maternal health to the dissemination of environmental ideas. Dr. Anttila-Hughes presented his work on the impact of Typhoons in the Philippines. Showing through rigorous quantitative analysis that the cost of typhoons is around 15 times greater in the year after the storm than the immediate damage and death reported by the media, due to losses for household incomes and increased infant mortality. Dr. Anttila-Hughes advisee Thomas Dreesen is a visiting researcher at ICCCAD. Thomas is working on a similar topic in Bangladesh looking at the impact of rainfall shocks on infant’s anthropometrics and women’s later life outcomes in Bangladesh. Thomas’ research is follows the growing evidence found by development economists on the strong relationship between early life environmental shocks and later life human capital outcomes.
Read Jesse’s blog.
