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Intro -- Contents -- Cover -- Title -- Foreword v -- About the Authors vii -- Acknowledgments ix -- Abbreviations and Acronyms xi -- 1. Introduction 1 -- 2. Why Should Regulators Be Interested in Efficiency? 5 -- 3. Some TFP Measurement and Decomposition Methods 25 -- 4. An Empirical Example 55 -- 5. Performance Measurement Issues in Regulation 75 -- 6. Dealing with Data Concerns in Practice 83 -- 7. Choice of Methodology 99 -- 8. Concluding Comments 105 -- Appendix: Capital Measurement 109 -- References 123 -- Index 131.

The authors use region-level panel data on rice production in Vietnam to investigate total factor productivity (TFP) growth in the period since reunification in 1975. Two significant reforms were introduced during this period, one in 1981 allowing farmers to keep part of their produce, and another in 1987 providing improved land tenure. They measure TFP growth using two modified forms of the standard Malmquist data envelopment analysis (DEA) method and the Full Cumulative (FC) methods. (DSE/DÜI)

In this article, we use data on five social inclusion indicators (poverty, inequality, unemployment, education and health) to assess and compare the performance of 15 European welfare states (EU15) over a 12-year period from 1995 to 2006. Aggregate measures of performance are obtained using index number methods similar to those employed in the construction of the widely used Human Development Index. These are compared with alternative measures derived from data envelopment analysis methods. The influence of methodology choice and the assumptions made in scaling indicators upon the results obtained is illustrated and discussed. We then analyse the evolution of performance over time, finding evidence of some convergence in performance and no sign of social dumping. ; Peer reviewed

In this paper we use data on five social inclusion indicators (poverty, inequality, unemployment, education and health) to assess the performance of 15 European welfare states (EU15) over a ten-year period from 1995 to 2004. Aggregate measures of performance are obtained using index number methods similar to those employed in the construction of the widely used Human Development Index (HDI). These are compared with alternative measures derived from data envelopment analysis (DEA) methods. The influence of methodology choice and the assumptions made in scaling indicators upon the results obtained is illustrated and discussed. We also analyse the evolution of performance over time, finding evidence of some convergence in performance and no sign of social dumping.

In this paper we use data on five social inclusion indicators (poverty, inequality, unemployment, education and health) to assess the performance of 15 European welfare states (EU15) over a ten-year period from 1995 to 2004. Aggregate measures of performance are obtained using index number methods similar to those employed in the construction of the widely used Human Development Index (HDI). These are compared with alternative measures derived from data envelopment analysis (DEA) methods. The influence of methodology choice and the assumptions made in scaling indicators upon the results obtained is illustrated and discussed. We also analyse the evolution of performance over time, finding evidence of some convergence in performance and no sign of social dumping.

AbstractThis paper applies a stochastic production frontier model to measure total factor productivity growth, technical efficiency change and technological change in Bangladesh crop agriculture for the 31 observations from 1960/61 to 1991/92, using data for 16 regions. The results reveal that technical change followed a U‐shaped pattern, rising from the early 1970s, when the green revolution varieties were adopted, giving an overall rate of technical progress at 0.27 per cent per year. However, technical efficiency declined throughout, at an estimated annual rate of 0.47 per cent. The combined effect of slow technical progress, dominated by the fall in technical efficiency resulted in total factor productivity (TFP) declining at a rate of 0.23 per cent per annum, with the rate of decline increasing in the later years. TFP change is shown to depend on the green revolution technology and agricultural research expenditures. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

During the 1990s the cooperative dairy processing sector in India was exposed to greater competition from private sector plants. In this paper we measure cost efficiency (decomposed into technical and allocative efficiency) at the dairy plant level in the cooperative and private sectors in India. Two efficiency measurement methods are used: stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and data envelopment analysis (DEA). The study utilizes an (incomplete) panel data sample of 23 plants, comprising 13 cooperative plants and 10 private plants, observed between 1992/93 and 1996/97. Our results indicate that cooperative plants are more cost efficient than private plants, although this difference is insignificant at the 5 per cent level. Furthermore, we observe that the cost efficiency of cooperative plants has not improved since market liberalization in 1991. These results suggest that the liberalization policy has not yet realized its expected benefits, and also cause us to question the general expectation that private operators will have efficiency advantages relative to cooperatives.