Water access and school absence among boys and girls: Evidence from rural Ghana

Abstract

This study investigates how access to water affects children's school attendance in rural Ghana. We use data from 7227 school-aged girls and boys from the seventh Ghana Living Standard Survey wave. The econometric analysis suggests that rural girls living in households with travel times of one hour or more to the water source are 4.5 percentage points more likely to miss school than rural boys and miss 12.2 per cent more school hours. Further investigation of the mechanisms suggests that the link between water access and girls' school absenteeism in rural areas may be due to younger girls taking on the household duties of older sisters or mothers, so that the latter can travel to fetch drinking water. The findings suggest that policy interventions that reduce time and effort involved in fetching drinking water are a necessary condition for reducing gender inequalities in school attendance.