IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cha/ysa001/v3y2010i1p39-76.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Technical efficiency of Swiss dairy farms locat-ed in the mountain area considering both eco-nomic and environmental resources

Author

Listed:
  • Pierrick Jan

    (Agroscope Reckenholz-Tänikon Research Station ART)

  • Markus Lips

    (Agroscope Reckenholz-Tänikon Research Station ART)

  • Michel Dumondel

    (ETH Zürich, Institute for Environmental Decisions)

Abstract

Increasing the efficiency of the use of economic and environmental resources of Swiss farms is a priority of Swiss agricultural policy as part of the objective of improving the sustainable performance of the Swiss agricultural sector. In this paper we assess the long-run technical efficiency of the use of economic and environmental resources of a sample of 480 Swiss dairy farms located in the mountain area using the non-parametric Data Envelopment Analy-sis approach. In a second step, using a linear regression, we inves-tigate the determinants of this technical efficiency. The results of the regression performed show that farm size and the strategic orientation of farm activity have a much greater effect on efficiency than the characteristics of the dairy production system or dairy herd management. An increase in farm size and an increased ori-entation towards para-agricultural activities are shown to exert a strong positive effect on technical efficiency. Conversely, part-time farming turns out to have a substantial negative impact on the effi-ciency of resource use.

Suggested Citation

  • Pierrick Jan & Markus Lips & Michel Dumondel, 2010. "Technical efficiency of Swiss dairy farms locat-ed in the mountain area considering both eco-nomic and environmental resources," Journal of Socio-Economics in Agriculture (Until 2015: Yearbook of Socioeconomics in Agriculture), Swiss Society for Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology, vol. 3(1), pages 39-76.
    • Handle: RePEc:cha:ysa001:v:3:y:2010:i:1:p:39-76
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://archive.jsagr.org/v3/YSA2010_2_Jan_Lips_39_76.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Daly, Herman E., 1992. "Allocation, distribution, and scale: towards an economics that is efficient, just, and sustainable," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(3), pages 185-193, December.
    2. I., Andreakos & V., Tzouvelekas & K., Mattas & E., Papanagiotou, 1997. "Estimation of technical efficiency in Greek livestock farms," Cahiers d'Economie et Sociologie Rurales, INRA Department of Economics, vol. 42, pages 93-107.
    3. Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Rhodes, E., 1978. "Measuring the efficiency of decision making units," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 2(6), pages 429-444, November.
    4. Ball, V.E. & Lovell, C.A K. & Nehring, R.F. & Somwaru, A., 1994. "Incorporating indesirable outputs into models of production: an application to US agriculture," Cahiers d'Economie et de Sociologie Rurales (CESR), Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), vol. 31.
    5. Timothy J. Coelli & D.S. Prasada Rao & Christopher J. O’Donnell & George E. Battese, 2005. "An Introduction to Efficiency and Productivity Analysis," Springer Books, Springer, edition 0, number 978-0-387-25895-9, June.
    6. R. D. Banker & A. Charnes & W. W. Cooper, 1984. "Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(9), pages 1078-1092, September.
    7. Fare, Rolf, et al, 1989. "Multilateral Productivity Comparisons When Some Outputs Are Undesirable: A Nonparametric Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 71(1), pages 90-98, February.
    8. Dyson, R. G. & Allen, R. & Camanho, A. S. & Podinovski, V. V. & Sarrico, C. S. & Shale, E. A., 2001. "Pitfalls and protocols in DEA," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 132(2), pages 245-259, July.
    9. Cropper, Maureen L & Oates, Wallace E, 1992. "Environmental Economics: A Survey," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 30(2), pages 675-740, June.
    10. Callens, Isabelle & Tyteca, Daniel, 1999. "Towards indicators of sustainable development for firms: A productive efficiency perspective," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 41-53, January.
    11. Aigner, Dennis & Lovell, C. A. Knox & Schmidt, Peter, 1977. "Formulation and estimation of stochastic frontier production function models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 21-37, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jan, Pierrick & Lips, Markus, 2012. "Total factor productivity change of Swiss dairy farms in the mountain region in the period 1999 to 2008," Review of Agricultural and Environmental Studies - Revue d'Etudes en Agriculture et Environnement (RAEStud), Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), vol. 93(3).
    2. Sebastian Lakner & Stefan Kirchweger & Daniel Hoop & Bernhard Brümmer & Jochen Kantelhardt, 2018. "The Effects of Diversification Activities on the Technical Efficiency of Organic Farms in Switzerland, Austria, and Southern Germany," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-18, April.
    3. Mamardashvili, Phatima & Emvalomatis, Grigorios & Jan, Pierrick, 2016. "Environmental Performance and Shadow Value of Polluting on Swiss Dairy Farms," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 41(2), May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhou, P. & Ang, B.W. & Poh, K.L., 2008. "A survey of data envelopment analysis in energy and environmental studies," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 189(1), pages 1-18, August.
    2. Beltrán-Esteve, Mercedes & Picazo-Tadeo, Andrés J., 2017. "Assessing environmental performance in the European Union: Eco-innovation versus catching-up," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 240-252.
    3. Christina Bampatsou & George Hadjiconstantinou, 2009. "The use of the DEA method for simultaneous analysis of the interrelationships among economic growth, environmental pollution and energy consumption," International Journal of Business and Economic Sciences Applied Research (IJBESAR), Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH), Kavala Campus, Greece, vol. 2(2), pages 65-86, December.
    4. Reinhard, Stijn & Knox Lovell, C. A. & Thijssen, Geert J., 2000. "Environmental efficiency with multiple environmentally detrimental variables; estimated with SFA and DEA," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 121(2), pages 287-303, March.
    5. Mai, Nhat Chi, 2015. "Efficiency of the banking system in Vietnam under financial liberalization," OSF Preprints qsf6d, Center for Open Science.
    6. Lauwers, Ludwig, 2009. "Justifying the incorporation of the materials balance principle into frontier-based eco-efficiency models," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(6), pages 1605-1614, April.
    7. Mekaroonreung, Maethee & Johnson, Andrew L., 2012. "Estimating the shadow prices of SO2 and NOx for U.S. coal power plants: A convex nonparametric least squares approach," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 723-732.
    8. Zanella, Andreia & Camanho, Ana S. & Dias, Teresa G., 2015. "Undesirable outputs and weighting schemes in composite indicators based on data envelopment analysis," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 245(2), pages 517-530.
    9. Ahn, Heinz & Clermont, Marcel & Langner, Julia, 2023. "Comparative performance analysis of frontier-based efficiency measurement methods – A Monte Carlo simulation," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 307(1), pages 294-312.
    10. Musshoff, Oliver & Hirschauer, Norbert & Herink, Michael, 2009. "Bei welchen Problemstrukturen sind Data-Envelopment-Analysen sinnvoll? Eine kritische Würdigung," German Journal of Agricultural Economics, Humboldt-Universitaet zu Berlin, Department for Agricultural Economics, vol. 58(02), pages 1-11, February.
    11. Cordero, José Manuel & Santín, Daniel & Sicilia, Gabriela, 2015. "Testing the accuracy of DEA estimates under endogeneity through a Monte Carlo simulation," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 244(2), pages 511-518.
    12. Cheng, Xiaomei & Bjørndal, Endre & Bjørndal, Mette, 2015. "Optimal Scale in Different Environments – The Case of Norwegian Electricity Distribution Companies," Discussion Papers 2015/22, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Business and Management Science.
    13. Reinhard Madlener & Carlos Henggeler Antunes & Luis C. Dias, 2006. "Multi-Criteria versus Data Envelopment Analysis for Assessing the Performance of Biogas Plants," CEPE Working paper series 06-49, CEPE Center for Energy Policy and Economics, ETH Zurich.
    14. Trinks, Arjan & Mulder, Machiel & Scholtens, Bert, 2020. "An Efficiency Perspective on Carbon Emissions and Financial Performance," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    15. Vittadini, Giorgio & Sturaro, Caterina & Folloni, Giuseppe, 2022. "Non-Cognitive Skills and Cognitive Skills to measure school efficiency," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    16. Thanh Ngo & Kan Wai Hong Tsui, 2022. "Estimating the confidence intervals for DEA efficiency scores of Asia-Pacific airlines," Operational Research, Springer, vol. 22(4), pages 3411-3434, September.
    17. George Halkos & George Papageorgiou, 2016. "Spatial environmental efficiency indicators in regional waste generation: a nonparametric approach," Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(1), pages 62-78, January.
    18. Imane Bounadi & Khalil Allali & Aziz Fadlaoui & Mohammed Dehhaoui, 2023. "Water Pollution Abatement in Olive Oil Industry in Morocco: Cost Estimates and Policy Implications," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-19, February.
    19. Sebastian Cuadros & Yeny E. Rodríguez & Javier Contreras, 2020. "Dynamic Data Envelopment Analysis Model Involving Undesirable Outputs in the Electricity Power Generation Sector: The Case of Latin America and the Caribbean Countries," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(24), pages 1-20, December.
    20. Seog-Chan Oh & Alfred J. Hildreth, 2014. "Estimating the Technical Improvement of Energy Efficiency in the Automotive Industry—Stochastic and Deterministic Frontier Benchmarking Approaches," Energies, MDPI, vol. 7(9), pages 1-27, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    efficiency analysis; economic resources; environmental resources; dairy farms; Switzerland;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q12 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Micro Analysis of Farm Firms, Farm Households, and Farm Input Markets
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth
    • Q57 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Ecological Economics

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cha:ysa001:v:3:y:2010:i:1:p:39-76. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Simon Briner (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://jsagr.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.