Impact of India's Demonetization on Domestic Agricultural Markets

This paper estimates the impact on domestic trade in agricultural commodities of India's demonetization exercise that invalidated 86% of the currency in circulation. Using data on arrivals and prices from close to 3000 regulated markets in India for 35 major agricultural commodities for the period 2011-2017, the focus is on short term effects up to 3 months after demonetization, tracking both the impact and recovery. These 35 commodities account for an overwhelming share of land under cultivation and value of production and hence are representative of Indian agriculture in more than one sense. Using earlier years as comparison years, the paper uses a combination of difference in differences techniques and synthetic control methods to identify the causal impact of demonetization.