Variation In Technical Efficiency Research Articles

The Size and Life-Cycle Growth of Plants: The Role of Productivity, Demand, and Wedges

Abstract What determines the distribution of establishments in terms of size and life-cycle growth? How are those determinants related to aggregate productivity? We provide novel answers by developing a framework that uses price and quantity information on establishments’ outputs and inputs to jointly estimate the demand and production parameters, and subsequently, establishments’ quality-adjusted productivity, deriving both micro-level and aggregate implications. We find that the dominant source of variation in establishment size is variation in quality/product appeal but that variation in technical efficiency plays an important supporting role. Multiple factors dampen dispersion in establishment size including dispersion in input (quality-adjusted) prices, markups, and residual wedges. Relatively moderate dampening factors induce large aggregate allocative efficiency losses relative to their absence. We show that joint estimation of the parameters of the demand and production function crucially affects inferences on the determinants of the size distribution of firms and their implications for aggregate productivity.

Analysis of technical efficiency of irrigated tomato production in North Gondar Zone of Amhara Regional State, Ethiopia

Ethiopia is a country with a total population of more than 110 million, of which about 80% of the total population is engaged in subsistence farming in rural areas. Although the agricultural sector plays a great role in the Ethiopian economy, it is characterized by low productivity due to technological and socioeconomic factors. Improving smallholder irrigated tomato production, and productivity would contribute to enhancing food security and alleviating poverty. Therefore, this study was investigated to fill this gap to analyze the technical efficiency of irrigated tomato production and its determinant factors in North Gondar Zone, Amhara Regional State, Ethiopia. Primary data were collected from 160 farmers selected using a multistage sampling procedure and analyzed using descriptive statistics, a parametric stochastic frontier production function model. The stochastic frontier and Cobb–Douglas functional form with a one-step approach were employed to analyze efficiency and factors affecting efficiency in irrigated tomato production. The estimated gamma parameters indicated that 0.69% of the total variation in tomato output was due to technical inefficiency. The means technical efficiency was found 60%, and about 6480.19 kg of tomato output per hectare was lost due to inefficiency factors implying there is a room for improvement in technical efficiency by 40% with the present technology. The Stochastic Production Frontier (SPF) result revealed that plot size at 1% and UREA at 10% probability level significantly influenced tomato production. The socio-economic variables that exercised an important role for variations in technical efficiency positively were the level of education, TLU, fair water distribution service and water in the morning, and in contrast watering frequency, marketing training, and credit were found to increase inefficiency significantly among farm households. To get better farmers' efficiency in the production of irrigated tomatoes continuous marketing training should be established and strengthening the available farmers training center (FTC) to improve farm productivity. The government and any concerned bodies should be built irrigation canals and other alternatives to reduce watering frequency. There should be a timely and sufficient supply of UREA to improve farmers’ efficiency in the production of tomatoes.

Analysis of Levels and Determinants of Technical Efficiency of Teff Producing Farmers: The Case of East Gojam Zone, Amhara Region, Ethiopia

This study explores Technical Efficiency level of smallholder teff production and also investigates socioeconomic determinants explaining the variation in Technical Efficiency among smallholder teff farmers using 396 random sample farm households in East Gojam Zone of Amhara regional state, Ethiopia. Cobb-Douglas Stochastic Frontier Model was fitted to estimate farm level technical efficiency and the associated efficiency scores since the function has been one of the most widely used models among the potential algebraic forms of production function in most empirical studies of agricultural production analysis. Both Maximum Likelihood (ML) and quantile regression (QR) techniques were employed to conduct the analysis of technical efficiency determinants. And the study revealed that a one % increase in the input level of plot size, seed, fertilizer, man-days and oxendays respectively produce a return of 0.30, 0.11, 0.02, 0.28 and 0.14% increase in output, keeping all other factors constant. In general, the result had underlined farmer’s opportunity to boost their productivity by optimizing the level of the inputs they are using. On this study the mean levels of the actual and potential output during the production year were 14.00 qt/ha and 21.07 qt/ha and, hence, with 7.07Qt/ha yield gap. Therefore, the ratio of the average yield gap to the average actual yield entails the possibility to increase the average plot level output by 50.5% through improving producers TE under the prevailing production input and technology level. The study also identified that farmers with more fertile plots are technically efficient as compared to those who cultivate marginal lands, keeping all other factors constant. Besides, those teff farmers who use compost have lower inefficiency as compared to those farmers who do not utilize compost in the study area. Moreover, education level influenced efficiency of teff farmers positively. Therefore, the study recommends the concerned bodies to give emphasis to promote education, and to have integrated soil fertility management policy targeting soil fertility enhancement to move the marginalized smallholder farmers TE closer to the frontier. Keywords: Technical efficiency, Stochastic frontier model, Quantile regression, Teff, Amhara, Ethiopia DOI: 10.7176/JESD/13-9-02 Publication date: May 31 st 2022

Technical efficiency evaluation of colorectal cancer care for older patients in Dutch hospitals.

Preoperative colorectal cancer care pathways for older patients show considerable practice variation between Dutch hospitals due to differences in interpretation and implementation of guideline-based recommendations. This study aims to report this practice variation in preoperative care between Dutch hospitals in terms of technical efficiency and identifying associated factors. Data on preoperative involvement of geriatricians, physical therapists and dieticians and the clinicians' judgement on prehabilitation implementation were collected using quality indicators and questionnaires among colorectal cancer surgeons and specialized nurses. These data were combined with registry-based data on postoperative outcomes obtained from the Dutch Surgical Colorectal Audit for patients aged ≥75 years. A two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) approach was used to calculate bias-corrected DEA technical efficiency scores, reflecting the extent to which a hospital invests in multidisciplinary preoperative care (input) in relation to postoperative outcomes (output). In the second stage, hospital care characteristics were used in a bootstrap truncated regression to explain variations in measured efficiency scores. Data of 25 Dutch hospitals were analyzed. There was relevant practice variation in bias-corrected technical efficiency scores (ranging from 0.416 to 0.968) regarding preoperative colorectal cancer surgery. The average efficiency score of hospitals was significantly different from the efficient frontier (p = <0.001). After case-mix correction, higher technical efficiency was associated with larger practice size (p = <0.001), surgery performed in a general hospital versus a university hospital (p = <0.001) and implementation of prehabilitation (p = <0.001). This study showed considerable variation in technical efficiency of preoperative colorectal cancer care for older patients as provided by Dutch hospitals. In addition to higher technical efficiency in high-volume hospitals and general hospitals, offering a care pathway that includes prehabilitation was positively related to technical efficiency of hospitals offering colorectal cancer care.

ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF YAM PROCESSING INTO YAM FLOUR IN SAKI AGRO ECOLOGICAL ZONE OF OYO STATE, NIGERIA

The study examined the economic analysis of yam processing into yam flour in Saki Agro ecological Zone of Oyo State. It specifically described the profitability of yam processing; examined the technical efficiency of yam processors and determined the effect of the socio-economic characteristics on technical efficiency. Data were collected with the aid of structured questionnaire and analyzed using descriptive statistics, profitability and budgetary analysis as well as stochastic frontier model and Garrett scale. The study reveals that majority of the respondents were female (88%) with a mean age of 47. The result shows that the rate of return on investment was 12 percent. The mean technical efficiency of the processors was 85% indicating that the yam processors were relatively efficient in allocating their limited resources. Some observable variables relating to socioeconomic characteristics such as processing experience and sex of the respondents significantly explains the variation in technical efficiency. Factors such as high cost of yam tubers, poor weather condition and inadequate processing facilities are the major factors that hinder the processing activities in the study area. The study therefore recommends that government policies should be made to improve the provision of inputs such as yam tubers and capital equipment at affordable price.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D;

Variations in technical efficiency of farmers with distinct land size across agro-climatic zones: Evidence from India

This paper attempts to analyze the variations in technical efficiency of the individual farmers of distinct (small, medium and large) size of land holdings and different types (family and hired) of labor with given set of input variables for the agricultural production across different Agro-Climatic Zones. A field survey was conducted to collect the information from a randomly stratified sample of 300 farmers operating in six districts falls under Trans-Gangetic Plains and Semi Sandy Desert zones of the states of Punjab and Haryana in India. A model of stochastic frontier analysis for cross sectional data with half normal truncated features has been used to measure the technical efficiency under the assumptions of Cobb-Douglas production function. The model comprises eight dummy variables for the farmers owning distinct size of land and using distinct type of labor in their production. The results for the estimates of technical inefficiency with family and hired labor depict; small farmers are 50.30 and 68.11 per cent, medium farmers are 61.09 and 67.75 per cent, large farmers are 71.03 and 56.67 per cent and average farmers are 71.94 and 70.07 per cent inefficient respectively. This paper helps the farmers and the policy makers in identifying the second best-alternative crop for obtaining the sustainable agricultural production.

Aquaculture efficiency and productivity: A comprehensive review and bibliometric analysis

The scientific research on aquaculture efficiency and productivity has been increasing over the years. This study aims to identify the publication trends and growth potential of aquaculture efficiency and productivity studies. A bibliometric analysis was employed for a sample of 85 scientific articles published during the 1998–2020 period. The findings show that authors and institutions have close groups in collaboration networks. Through the citation analysis, three clusters were obtained that were related to the use of stochastic frontier analysis in an empirical application, Norwegian salmon aquaculture, and efficiency studies associated to freshwater aquaculture. For the temporal evolution of the keywords, earlier existing studies adopted a stochastic translog production function to assess the technical efficiency of aquaculture production, whereas later studies used data envelopment analysis, which focused on more diverse research objectives. The farms or subsectors of aquaculture in Norway, Bangladesh, and Vietnam have been analyzed in-depth for the efficiency and productivity in the existing studies. Education, experience, and age of farmers are often used as determinants to explain the variations in technical efficiency. The present study concludes that aquaculture efficiency and productivity research is not moving toward a mature stage. Several of the discovered issues are only focused on specific countries, and there is still room for methodological improvement in assessing aquaculture efficiency and productivity. Nevertheless, research collaborations are growing, and new research trends that are related to environmental regulation and pollution show great interest in aquaculture efficiency and productivity. This study provides a clear roadmap for researchers and practitioners to understand the publication patterns and hotspots in the research field.

Technical efficiency and its determinants in the Indian textile garments industry

PurposeThis paper aims to examine technical efficiency and its determinants in Indian textile garments industry in post-agreement on textiles and clothing regime and evaluate the technical efficiency among micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) firms.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses unbalanced panel data for the period 2005–2010 to 2015–2016. The stochastic frontier function is used to estimate technical efficiency and its determinants.FindingsThe results show that the overall ecosystem of textile garments’ value chains could be improved to enhance the technical efficiency thereof. The result also reveals that small-scale firms have the highest technical efficiency scores, and medium-scale firms have the least technical efficiency score among all the categories of MSMEs.Research limitations/implicationsThe textile garments industry needs to define its innovation strategies, as these strategies lead to different results that can be achieved only through the management of resources dedicated to the generation and implementation of innovations.Practical implicationsThis study has shown that to offset India’s cost disadvantage in the international markets, there is a need to develop an ecosystem of textile manufacturing and value chains, eliminate the inverted duty structure (where inputs are taxed at a higher rate than the final product) and switch over from shuttle looms toward shuttle-less looms. This would unleash the potential of textile and garments industry and make it globally competitive and technically efficient. Further, there will be an alignment with the ease of doing business with an appropriate mix of policy, technology, institution, infrastructure, information and services.Originality/valueUsing frontier production function takes stochastic context into account for the dynamic character of technical efficiency and its components. Most of the past studies have assessed technical efficiency at the aggregate level using three-digit National Industrial Classification (NIC) or four-digit NIC code. An analysis at higher levels of aggregation masks the variation in technical efficiency. This study used five-digit NIC data to measure the firm-specific technical efficiency of the textile industry. According to the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first of its kind in the Indian textile industry using stochastic frontier approach and panel data. Further, it also looks at the contribution of different determinants in technical efficiency to the firms.

Inter-state variation in technical efficiency and total factor productivity of India's livestock sector

During last two and half decades (1990–2016), the Total Factor Productivity (TFP) of livestock sector has grown at an annual rate of 3.9%. However, there are significant variations in it across states. It is estimated very high in Tamil Nadu (8.7%), Andhra Pradesh (7.6%) & Odisha (7.6%) and extremely low in Jammu & Kashmir (0.6%), Himachal Pradesh (−0.4%) and Bihar (−4.3%). Interestingly, TFP growth has been driven by technical change. The estimates of scale efficiency indicate scope of raising output by about 30% even at the existing levels of input-use. The findings suggest the need for greater investment in animal science research and development, especially in the states that have poorly performed on technological front.

Assessing the efficiency of Iran health system in making progress towards universal health coverage: a comparative panel data analysis

BackgroundBuilding upon decades of continuous reforms, Iran has been implementing various initiatives to reach universal health coverage (UHC). Improving efficiency is a crucial intermediate policy objective for UHC. Therefore, this article aimed to measure the efficiency and productivity changes of the Iranian health system in making progress towards UHC during 2010−2015 in comparison with 36 selected other upper-middle-income countries.MethodsWe used panel data to measure the variations in technical efficiency (TE) and total factor productivity (TFP) through an extended data envelopment analysis (EDEA) and Malmquist productivity index, respectively. General government health expenditure (GGHE) per capita (International dollar) was selected as the input variable. Service coverage of diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis; family planning; antiretroviral therapy; skilled attendants at birth; Tuberculosis treatment success rate; and GGHE as % of total health expenditure (THE) were considered as output variables. The data for each indicator were taken from the Global Health Observatory data repository and World Development Indicator database, for 6 years (2010−2015).ResultsThe TE scores of Iran’s health system were 0.75, 0.77, 0.74, 0.74, 0.97, and 0.84 in the period 2010–2015, respectively. TFP improved in 2011 (1.02), 2013 (1.01), and 2014 (1.30, generally). The overall efficiency and TFP increased in 2014. Changes made in CCHE per capita and GGHE/THE attributed to the increase of efficiency.ConclusionThere is a growing demand for efficiency improvements in the health systems to achieve UHC. While there are no defined set of indicators or precise methods to measure health system efficiency, EDEA helped us to draw the picture of health system efficiency in Iran. Our findings highlighted the essential need for targeted and sustained interventions, i.e., allocation of enough proportion of public funds to the health sector, to improve universal financial coverage against health costs aiming to enhance the future performance of Iran’s health system, ultimately. Such tailored interventions may also be useful for settings with similar context to speed up their movement towards improving efficiency, which in turn might lead to more resources to reach UHC.

English

The study is aimed at determining the technical efficiency of rice farmers in Anambra State value chain development programme. A well-structured questionnaire was administered to elicit information from 372 rice farmers from the five participating Local Government Areas (Ayamelum, Awka North, Anambra West, Anambra East, and Orumba North) after which only 337 respondents were fit for the study. Cobb Douglas stochastic frontier model was used to ascertain the frontier line of the farmer’s production potentials. The determinant of technical inefficiency was sex and farming experience. The findings revealed that the gamma value (0.0315) captures the variation in technical efficiency by farmers, therefore, about 3.15% variation is observed and frontier output is due to rice farmer’s technical inefficiency effect. The study equally showed that the mean technical efficiency as predicted in the study was 84.76% implying that the farmers are operating 15.24% below their optimum production capacity. These, therefore, justify the need for policymakers to constantly organize training and sensitization workshops for the rice farmers in Anambra State and Nigeria at large paying particular attention to women farmers and the general farmer’s farming experience which will help to tailor down training to specific needs. Key words: Stochastic frontier, technical efficiency and inefficiency, return to scale, influence, utilization, sensitization.

Determinants of Technical Efficiency in Wheat Production in Ethiopia

Ethiopia is the second largest wheat producing countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and most people rely on rain fed agriculture for their livelihoods. Wheat production has increased from 2,176,603 tons in 2005 to 4,219,257 tons in 2016 with 51.6% production volume increment. However, this production cannot meet the consumption demand and obliged to import wheat because of rapid population growth. This study intended to determine the technical efficiency of smallholder wheat farmers in Ethiopia. The main objective of study was to examine the effect of demographic, socioeconomic and institutional factors on technical efficiency of small holder wheat farmers in Ethiopia. The study used household level cross sectional data collected in 2015/16 cropping season from 1611 sample farmers selected by multistage sampling technique. A stochastic production frontier and two-limit Tobit regression models were used to estimate level of technical efficiency and identify factors affecting technical efficiency respectively. The study indicated that the average technical efficiency level of wheat producing farmers was 62% implying that there was technical efficiency variation among smallholder farmers in the study area. The result implied that there is an opportunity for wheat producers to increase output at existing levels of inputs with present technologies. By shifting the average farmer to the production frontier, the average yield would increase by 0.5 tons per hectare. The two-limit Tobit regression model results showed that experience of growing wheat, family size, own farm labor, livestock size, extension contact and training had positive and significant effect on technical efficiency. However, distant wheat plot have a negative and significance effect on technical efficiency level of the farmers. This suggests attention to productivity gains arising from efficient use of existing technologies is necessary. Therefore, the study suggested, policies and strategies should be directed towards increasing productivity through improving efficiency of the production process.

Analysis of technical efficiency of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) production in Chilga District, Amhara National Regional State, Ethiopia

BackgroundPotato is one of the major staple crops in the Eastern and Central Africa sub-region. Its importance continues to rise due to increased urbanization and demand for potato is projected. This increase will definitely come with its share of challenges that need to be addressed. This study was aimed to measure the level of technical efficiency, yield loss due to inefficiency and identify the factors that influence the efficiency levels of potato producers’ in Chilga District. Primary data were collected from 150 farmers selected using multistage sampling procedure and analyzed using descriptive statistics, a parametric stochastic frontier production function models.ResultsThe results of the study indicated that the minimum, maximum and average yields of potato production in the sample households were 1000, 36,000 and 13,108 kg/ha, respectively. The stochastic frontier and Cobb–Douglas functional form with a one-step approach was employed to analyze efficiency and factors affecting efficiency in potato production. The mean technical efficiency (TE) was found to be 46%, and about 17,782.43 kg of potato output per hectare was lost due to inefficiency factors implying there is a room for improvement in technical efficiency by 54% with the present technology. The Stochastic Production Frontier (SPF) result revealed that DAP at 5% and Oxen, MDE and seed at 1% probability level significantly influencing potato production. The socio-economic variables that exercised important role for variations in technical efficiency positively were age and improved seed and nevertheless distance to market was found to increase inefficiency significantly among farm household.ConclusionsThere is considerable difference in the efficiency level among plots. Hence if inputs are used to their maximum potential, there will be considerable gain from improvement in technical efficiency. The estimated SPF model together with the inefficiency parameters shows that age and improved seed variety were influenced by inefficiency negatively whereas distance to market increased the level of technical inefficiency.

Technical Efficiency of Women Self Help Groups (SHG) Generating Poultry Activity in Amravati District of Maharashtra

Women are a vital part of the Indian economy and employment to build their empowerment by the provision of loans and financial services is an important aspect of any economy. Rural women of India have been benefited by the Self Help Groups (SHG). The SHG can approach any bank for availing loan facility to undertake any suitable earning activity. The loan is repaid out of the profits earned. A study was carried out for the year 2016-2017 for Amravati division, 50 SHGs, which were engaged in selected agriculture, poultry-based activity. The objectives for the study were to analyze the technical efficient self-help groups and identify the possible determinant of technical efficiency of self-help groups; Primary data was collected with the help of personal interview of self-help groups. Those Self-help groups were selected for the study which has activity in existence of at least 10 years, In poultry SHGs the elasticity of a cost per borrower and subsidy variables were a positively significant contribution in the gross loan. Negative Marginal value productivity of assets, Loan per member and net returns are determined to know the contribution in the gross loan Among selected SHGs, the variations in technical efficiency was 0.7632-0.9966. The study concludes that it is necessary to increase the assets and borrow per member for SHGs income generating activities which will be the make the SHGs members to increase the net income to refund, therefore assets, borrow per member and net returns are the possible determinant of the gross loan portfolio. The amount needs to be fixed according to the income generating activities and borrow per member increases contribute more to their family income.

A data envelopment analysis of West Virginia school districts

West Virginia schools are consistently below the national average on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Using Data Envelopment Analysis, we estimate the technical efficiency of West Virginia school districts. We find less variation in technical efficiency in West Virginia than in similar studies conducted in other states. This appears to be because of state policy imposing homogeneity of input usage. Due to the limited variation in technical efficiency across districts, we cannot analyze how non-school inputs such as socioeconomic factors affect technical efficiency across districts. Summary statistics organized by county economic status, however, suggest that socioeconomic status plays a role. Our results highlight an important limitation of DEA analysis on schools.

Performance and productivity in Islamic and conventional banks: Evidence from the global financial crisis

We assess the performance and productivity of Islamic and conventional banks using financial ratios, a two- and a four-component meta-frontier Malmquist productivity index (MPI). We focus on the relatively homogenous GCC region over the 2006–2012 period that covers the global financial crisis. We find that Islamic banks exhibit worse cost and profit performance but are on a par with regards to revenue performance compared to the conventional ones. The components of the meta-frontier MPI suggest that the technology of conventional banks improves markedly in years leading to the financial crisis and declines thereafter. Islamic banks show a similar but more muted pattern. By contrast, the pronounced within-Islamic bank group variation in technical efficiency and technology suggests that Islamic banks are quite heterogeneous as a group. Overall, the MPI analysis suggests that the two bank types are more aligned following the global financial crisis. Policy makers should be wary of the important variations within the Islamic banking industry when implementing bank regulations.

Technical-efficiency analysis of end-of-life care in long-term care facilities within Europe: A cross-sectional study of deceased residents in 6 EU countries (PACE).

BackgroundAn ageing population in the EU leads to a higher need of long-term institutional care at the end of life. At the same time, healthcare costs rise while resources remain limited. Consequently, an urgency to extend our knowledge on factors affecting efficiency of long-term care facilities (LTCFs) arises. This study aims to investigate and explain variation in technical efficiency of end-of-life care within and between LTCFs of six EU countries: Belgium (Flanders), England, Finland, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland. In this study, technical efficiency reflects the LTCFs’ ability to obtain maximal quality of life (QoL) and quality of dying (QoD) for residents from a given set of resource inputs (personnel and capacity).MethodsCross-sectional data were collected by means of questionnaires on deceased residents identified by LTCFs over a three-month period. An output-oriented data-envelopment analysis (DEA) was performed, producing efficiency scores, incorporating personnel and capacity as input and QoL and QoD as output. Scenario analysis was conducted. Regression analysis was performed on explanatory (country, LTCF type, ownership, availability of palliative care and opioids) and case mix (disease severity) variables.Results133 LTCFs of only one type (onsite nurses and offsite GPs) were considered in order to reduce heterogeneity. Variation in LTCF efficiency was found across as well as within countries. This variation was not explained by country, ownership, availability of palliative care or opioids. However, in the ‘hands-on care at the bedside’ scenario, i.e. only taking into account nursing and care assistants as input, Poland (p = 0.00) and Finland (p = 0.04) seemed to be most efficient.ConclusionsEfficiency of LTCFs differed extensively across as well as within countries, indicating room for considerable efficiency improvement. Our findings should be interpreted cautiously, as comprehensive comparative EU-wide research is challenging as it is influenced by many factors.

Resources, innovation and performance in labor courts in Brazil

Abstract This article examines the relationships between resources, innovation, and performance in courts. Data from 24 Brazilian labor courts covering the period between 2003 and 2013 were used to develop theoretical/empirical models using Data Envelopment Analysis and stochastic frontier analysis. The results indicate that there was improvement in the performance of the courts during the period examined. This improvement owed more to the adoption of innovations than to variation in technical efficiency. Critical periods for the adoption of the electronic judicial process (in 2006 and 2012) had a negative impact on the index related to innovation adoption. The stochastic model shows that court size and investment in the training of personnel are key factors for explaining the variation in the efficiency of the courts.

Technical efficiency and production risk of maize production: Evidence from Ghana

The paper performs an investigation of maize production efficiency in Ghana by the stochastic frontier model with flexible riskproperties using a cross section of 232 farms from the Brong-Ahafo Region. The findings of the study are the translog model isbest fit for the mean output function, whilst the input variables: seed, herbicide, land, labor and cost of intermediate inputspositively influence maize output at decreasing returns to scale. The study also finds that seed and labor inputs are negativelyrelated to production risk, whilst land and cost of intermediate inputs are classified as risk increasing inputs. The averagetechnical efficiency estimate is 62% and the combined farm specific factors explain the variation in technical efficiency. Thestudy concludes that on the average 38% of potential output is lost due to technical inefficiency and production risk in inputsand the use of the best farm practices contribute to produce maize optimally.

Modelling regional productivity performance across Western Europe

ABSTRACTThis study investigates the potential role of variations in technical efficiency as a contributing factor in providing an explanation for convergence or divergence in Western Europe. To control for spatial dependence among regions, it uses a spatial stochastic frontier framework that integrates spatial econometric techniques with stochastic frontier panel-data models. The empirical analysis reveals there is a strong geographical pattern of regional efficiency, while the degree of average regional efficiency has increased steadily year by year. From a European regional policy perspective, we can conclude that differentiated development strategies seem more appropriate than homogeneous or best-practice investment approaches.