TY - BOOK ID - 134946125 TI - Benefits of Electrification and the Role of Reliability : Evidence from India AU - Samad, Hussain. AU - Zhang, Fan. PY - 2016 PB - Washington, D.C. : The World Bank, DB - UniCat KW - Distributional Impact KW - Quantile Regression KW - Reliability Of Electricity KW - Rural Electrification UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:134946125 AB - This paper estimates the welfare impact of rural electrification in India using nationally representative household panel survey data for 2005 and 2012. Analysis based on a propensity-score-weighted fixed-effects model finds that while electrification is associated with a broad range of social and economic benefits, the size of the effects depends importantly on the reliability of electricity service. Gaining access to electricity combined with a reliable power supply is associated with a 17 percent increase in income during the sample period, but gaining access to electricity alone is associated with only a 9.6 percent increase in income. The net gain from both increasing the access rate and reducing power outages in rural India is estimated to be USD 11 billion a year. Moreover, India's rural electrification policy appears to be progressive because lower-income households benefit more from access to electricity than higher-income households during the sample period. ER -