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The extent of resource use inefficiencies in cotton production in Pakistan's Punjab: an application of Data Envelopment Analysis
Author(s) -
Shafiq Muhammad,
Rehman Tahir
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
agricultural economics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.29
H-Index - 82
eISSN - 1574-0862
pISSN - 0169-5150
DOI - 10.1111/j.1574-0862.2000.tb00078.x
Subject(s) - allocative efficiency , data envelopment analysis , production (economics) , inefficiency , economics , product (mathematics) , agriculture , resource (disambiguation) , agricultural economics , microeconomics , statistics , computer science , mathematics , geography , computer network , geometry , archaeology
This paper attempts to identify sources of resource use inefficiency for cotton production in Pakistan's Punjab. The use of a non‐parametric method, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), is developed to study the relative technical and allocative efficiencies of individual farms which use similar inputs, produce the same product and operate under comparable circumstances. In the ‘cotton‐wheat’ system of Pakistan, there are a considerable number of farms that are both technically and allocatively inefficient. The use of DEA shows that the technique provides a clear identification of both the extent and the sources of technical and allocative inefficiencies in cotton production. However, both the interpretation of the farm level results generated and the projection of these results to a higher level require care, given the technical nature of the agricultural production processes.