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Graduate School of Economics and Management, Tohoku University

Professor, Graduate School of Economics and Management, Tohoku University

Artisanal mining (Garimpo) has expanded rapidly in Brazil, especially in the Amazon. It releases mercury and other heavy metals into rivers, which can expose communities far from any mine. Little is known about whether this exposure affects children’s learning. This paper uses the direction of Brazil’s river network to identify the effect of upstream Garimpo activity on downstream schools. We combine school-level scandalized test scores averages about 4,000 schools, between 2007 and 2019, mining area per municipality, matched to each school through the national hydrographic network. Greater upstream Garimpo exposure is associated with lower standardized test outcomes. The effects are concentrated among schools that rely directly on river water. The effects are also concentrated on the Amazon, and they extend to school approval rates. The results suggest that the social costs of artisanal gold mining reach communities beyond the municipalities where mining takes place.(JEL Classification: Q53, I25, and O13)