Abstract
To optimize the installation distribution of water-saving techniques and improve the efficiency of water-saving agricultural inputs, we used a three-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) model and Chinese provincial panel data from 2014 to 2016 to analyze the input efficiency of the water-saving irrigation. This study explores the efficiency derived from the efforts of water-saving initiatives in the agricultural sector in China. We present the impacts of factors such as technology, scale, diminishing marginal revenue, and crop water requirements on the research results. We found overall efficiency of water-saving irrigation is increasing nationally. The efficiency of water-saving irrigation input will significantly increase if management and organization of the input improve. Increasing the investment in areas with increasing marginal revenue would improve the local agricultural water-saving input efficiency in areas such as Hainan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Tibet, and Qinghai; although in areas with large water requirement for major crops, such as Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang, the efficiency of water-saving irrigation is generally high. Shanxi requires a large amount of water as the efficiency of agricultural water-saving input is 0.07, which is relatively lower than the average efficiency of all regions (0.39). The cultivated area index and the GDP per capita had no significant effect on the irrigation input efficiency.
Highlights
Water resource shortages have become a serious problem in China
The result is reflected in the comprehensive technical efficiency, pure technical efficiency, and scale efficiency
We propose that the marginal revenue of input efficiency in agricultural water-saving inputs is diminishing, which means that after a regional water-saving irrigation input produces certain effects, the efficiency of the subsequent input is less than that of the previous input efficiency
Summary
Water resource shortages have become a serious problem in China. It is estimated that the per capita water resources will be reduced to one-quarter of the world average (1760 m3 ) by 2030, which is close to the lowest level of the countries with recognized water shortages. More than 400 of the 669 cities in China have insufficient water supply, 108 cities are seriously deprived of water, and the water shortage exceeds 6 billion m3 in China annually [2]. This has affected the normal production and lives of more than 160 million people [3,4]. The amount of blue water resources in eight provinces is still unable to cover the needs of the domestic ecosystem, including in Qinghai province, which is known as the “source of rivers” [5]
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