Open Philanthropy recommended a grant of $216,250 to the Council on Energy, Environment, and Water (CEEW) to support their research on crop residue burning in Punjab in the winter of 2022. CEEW will conduct a survey of farmers in Punjab to ask about residue burning and the availability of alternative uses for crop residue and document case studies of farmers and villages that don’t burn crop residue.
Residue burning in October and November is a large source of air pollution in North India. We believe that CEEW’s analysis will help track year-on-year progress and inform policy decisions on this issue.
This follows our February 2021 support and falls within our focus area of South Asian air quality.