Health Effects of Coal: A Long-Run Relationship Assessment of Coal Production and Respiratory Health in Kazakhstan

摘要

Respiratory diseases, like asthma and other chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, claim over 50 thousand lives annually in Kazakhstan according to national statistics (The Agency of Statistics of the Republic of Kazakhstan, 2011). This study applies econometric methods to examine the relationship between the coal industry and the respiratory health in Kazakhstan during the country's independency period using annual national data. The study investigates long-term equilibrium and short-term dynamics of coal production and respiratory diseases in Kazakhstan by applying the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM). The empirical results show that the respiratory diseases appear to be elastic relative to the coal production, and the strong long-run and short-run Granger causality running from coal production to respiratory diseases. The presence of causal relationship could be useful to define effective policies to reduce the health effects of coal industry in Kazakhstan.