Trois essais en économie de l'environnement et du développement

Do household and institutional responses to environmental disruptions sustainable, or do they inadvertently generate vulnerabilities? This thesis investigates the intersection between environment and development issues through applied microeconomic analysis in Madagascar. The first chapter examines crop diversification as a household adaptation strategy to droughts. The second chapter analyzes the consequences of Protected Areas (PAs) on child health. The third chapter assesses whether historical legacies, missionary and colonial settlements, influence PA effectiveness. To address these questions, the thesis lies on multiple economic subfields (agricultural, health, economic history, development, and environment) and relies on a rich and diverse datasets (household surveys, child health data, historical records, and high-resolution spatial data). Methodologically, it employs a range of causal inference techniques (instrumental variables, fixed effects, matching methods, and difference-in-differences estimators). Overall, the findings highlight that while some responses generate joint environmental and socioeconomic benefits, others involve significant trade-offs.