The spatial and economic footprint of the coal industry on rural livelihoods in Jharkhand, India

PIs selected Households living within 5 to 20 KMs from the active coal mine. The surveys were conducted over the phone by Morsel due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The questionnaire covered aspects of employment, subjective assessments of the importance of various sectors, trust and preferences with respect to the coal sector and the state government, and household socio-economic and demographic characteristics. This project provided new evidence of the spatial nature of formal and informal coal-related employment. This work sheds light on the concentrated spatial footprint of extractive industries and broader challenges of employment informality relevant to necessary just transition and rural development policies in India. The socio-economic dimensions of coal mining in India form a complex picture of inter-linked livelihoods and economic dependencies. Researchers addressed two research questions. Firstly, what sources of livelihoods are relied upon in rural villages proximate to coal mines in Jharkhand? Secondly, how does coal-related livelihood dependence manifest at different distances from these coal mines?