Weather and Conflicts in Afghanistan

Summary

Monir Elias Bounadi.

This Working Paper combine high-resolution data on temperature and precipitation with georeferenced data on conflict events to explore the link between local weather variations and conflict incidence for all districts of Afghanistan between July 2005 and December 2016. By utilizing exogenous interannual variation in daily temperature and precipitation within district-months, the author, Bounadi, find that exchanging colder for warmer days tends to increase the likelihood of conflict and that precipitation does not drive the occurrence of conflict. Bounadi provide suggestive evidence that temperature shocks to opium production do not explain the observed temperature-conflict link.