Stakeholder perception on corporate reputation and management efficiency : Evidence from the Spanish Defence sector

The Spanish Ministry of Defence was the first to elaborate a Social Responsibility (SR) report stating that efficiency plays a leading role. The territorial organs to manage the image and trust in the armed forces, are given by the Spanish Defence Delegations (SDD), and all of them are certified with a seal of excellence. In this work, defence economics and analysis of efficiency line up with the concept of SR. The main aim is to analyse if SR policy has an effective influence and, as a consequence, a high degree of performance can be expected. To this end, given a set of discretionary variables, the efficiency of the 19 SDD during the 2015-2017 period is analysed by means of Data Envelopment Analysis technique. A bootstrap procedure is used to eliminate the bias of the estimates and obtain a robust ranking. The results show an unusual positive behavior in public sector

An evaluation of Nigerian ports post-concession performance

Purpose: The quest for efficiency is claimed to be the major objective of port privatisation and this has led many ports in Africa to undertake port reforms. Based on this, Nigerian ports were concessioned and operations were handed over in one scoop to private operators between 2006 and 2007. This paper is looking to investigate in the reform that took place in a very short period of time improved the performance of Nigerian ports. This paper is also looking to provide a model for future evaluation. Research Approach: A window based DEA model with panel data will be employed to measure pre- and post concession Nigerian ports' performance to determine efficiency gains from port reform. Secondly, to demonstrate how concession influence efficiency, a DEA based Malmquist productivity Insex will be used to determine the sources of (in)efficiency by decomposing the efficiency into frontier shift effects and catch-up effects. Findings and Originality: The results revealed that none of the ports is hundred percent efficient before and after concession but rather a tremendous increase in throughput and ship traffic after the reform in most of the ports. Apapa port is the most efficient while Calabar and Warri are inefficient although there were fluctuations in efficiency in all the ports. The research is inconclusive because it is still ongoing Although some studies have investigated the relationship between port efficiency and privatisation however several gaps still exist as the studies are skewed in favour of container ports in the developed world, mainly in Europe. Therefore, the need arises to critically look at the overall efficiency of national port system to enhance the efficiency of global transport chain. Research Impact: The study will contribute to existing literature on port performance being the first to evaluate the post concession performance of a major maritime player in Sub-Saharan Africa. It will contribute to the never- ending debate by the Academia on the effect of ownership or privatisation on efficiency from the perspective of port institutional reforms in the third world countries Practical Impact: It will benefit the Federal Government of Nigeria as a reference document of the first five years of the port reform policy and help the Government to intervene in areas of observed inefficiencies and make adjustments where possible. On the part of the "Landlord" NPA it will help them in the performing their regulatory role by identifying the operators who are making inefficient use of the resources allocated to them and provide the basis for future evaluation. Finally, it will give the various stake holders in the Maritime Industry a full grasp of the effect of concession in a Nation's port as Nigeria is the first country in the world to hand over terminal operations in all her ports in one scoop

Performance assessment of public-funded R&D organizations working on similar research streams: A multinational study

The subject of deriving a measure of efficiency of public-funded organizations (primarily not-for-profit organizations) and of ranking these efficiency measures have been major subjects of debate and discussion. In the present study, the methodology of data envelopment analysis (DEA) has been used to analyze the relative performances of public funded R&D organizations across multiple countries working in similar research streams with multiple measures of inputs and outputs. The keywords highlighting the major research areas in the field of non-metrology conducted by National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in India were utilized to select the global comparators working in similar research streams. These global comparators were three R&D organizations located in the USA and one each located in Germany and Japan. The relative efficiencies of the organizations were assessed with variables such as external cash flow (ECF) earned, technologies transferred, publications and patents as outputs and grants received from the parent body and scientific personnel as inputs. The study indicates suggested measures and a set of targets to achieve the best possible performance for NPL and other R&D organizations

AoA Paradigm for Early Visibility of Logistics and Cost in the Acquisition Process

NPS NRP Technical ReportAoA Paradigm for Early Visibility of Logistics and Cost in the Acquisition ProcessN4 - Fleet Readiness & LogisticsThis research is supported by funding from the Naval Postgraduate School, Naval Research Program (PE 0605853N/2098). https://nps.edu/nrpChief of Naval Operations (CNO)Approved for public release. Distribution is unlimited.

Non-parametric Linear Technique for Measuring the Efficiency of Winter Road Maintenance in the Arctic Area

Improving the performance of Winter Road Maintenance (WRM) can increase the traffic safety and reduce the cost as well as environmental impacts. This study evaluates the efficiency of WRM technique, named salting, in the Arctic area by using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), which is a non-parametric linear method to measure the efficiencies of decision-making units (DMUs) based on handling multiple inputs and multiple outputs at the same time that their associated weights are not known. Here, roads are considered as DMUs for which the efficiency must be determined. The three input variables considered are traffic flow, road area and WRM cost. In addition, the two output variables included are level of safety in the roads and environment impacts resulted from WRM, which is also considered as an uncontrollable factor in the second scenario. The results show the performance of DMUs from the most efficient WRM to the inefficient/least efficient one and this information provides decision makers with technical support and the required suggested improvements for inefficient WRM, in order to achieve a cost-effective WRM and a safe road transportation during wintertime in the Arctic areas

Fuel Efficiency Assessment with DEA

In this study, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used to calculate Air Mobility Command (AMC) airlift fuel efficiency for C-17 aircraft. Fuel is a strategic asset for the United States Air Force and suitable alternatives are not yet feasible or available in the quantity required. The Air Force is pursuing several initiatives to conserve energy and operate more efficiently while sustaining the same level of effectiveness and safety. In order to manage these initiatives, it must measure how well it is doing. To measure airlift efficiency, the AMC Fuel Efficiency Office established a 7 factor weighted Fuel Efficiency Index (FEI). To produce a monthly score, AMC assigned weights for each factor. DEA does not require such a priori assumptions and finds the best set of weights that will help each mission to represent itself in the best manner. The results showed that DEA and FEI agree in trends but a DEA Slack-Based Measure better differentiates inefficiencies than other methods used in the study. Also, the results showed that for current Air Mobility flights, at least 10% input excess or output shortfall occurs each month

Do the opportunity costs of providing crop diversity differ between organic and conventional farms? The case of Finnish agriculture

The attractiveness of targeted environmental policies on farmlands depends crucially on the opportunity costs of the conservation programs. We use a crop diversity index as an indicator of environmental output to compare the efficiency of conventional and organic crop farms. Technical efficiency scores are estimated by applying data envelopment analysis to a sample of Finnish farms for the period 1994 – 2002. We also estimate shadow values, or the opportunity costs, of producing crop diversity. Our results show that there is variation in the shadow values between farms and the technology adopted. The findings provide a basis for designing cost-effective policy instruments such as auctions for conservation payments

EFFICIENCY IN AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION OF BIODIVERSITY: ORGANIC VS. CONVENTIONAL PRACTICES

Promotion of environmental sustainable farming practices is an important policy goal for the whole agricultural sector. However, when the efficiency of production is measured in practice, enhancement of environmental quality such as biodiversity and other environmental amenities does not seem to be recognized as a positive output produced by agriculture. Here, we include crop diversity index as an indicator of environmental output in a comparison of efficiency of conventional and organic crop farms. Non-parametric technical efficiency scores are estimated applying data envelopment analysis on a sample of Finnish crop farms for 1994 – 2002. The results show that in a pooled data set conventional crop farms are more technically efficient than organic farms when only crop output is considered. When taking crop diversity into account the difference between production techniques vanishes. In separate comparisons of conventional and organic farms, the average efficiencies of the two groups do not differ statistically significantly. Thus, the assumptions on the technology and reference sets are crucial with respect to the results of the comparison. This has important implications for policy evaluations when alternative farming technologies are compared.crop diversity, Shannon index, DDEA, technical efficiency, Environmental Economics and Policy, Farm Management, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

Dynamic DEA: A slacks-based measure approach

総合政策 / Multi Disciplinary policy studiesIn data envelopment analysis, there are several methods for measuring efficiency change over time, e.g. the window analysis and the Malmquist index. However, they usually neglect carry-over activities between consecutive two terms. These carry-overs play an important role in measuring the efficiency of decision making units in each term as well as over the whole terms based on the long-term viewpoint. Dynamic DEA model proposed by Färe and Grosskopf is the first innovative contribution for such purpose. In this paper we develop their model in the slacks-based measure (SBM) framework, called Dynamic SBM (DSBM). The SBM model is non-radial and can deal with inputs/outputs individually, contrary to the radial approaches that assume proportional changes in inputs/outputs. Furthermore, according to the characteristics of carry-overs, we classify them into four categories, i.e. desirable, undesirable, free and fixed. Desirable carry-overs correspond, for example, to profit carried forward and net earned surplus carried to the next term, while undesirable carry-overs include, for example, loss carried forward, bad debt and dead stock. Free and fixed carry-overs indicate, respectively, discretionary and non-discretionary ones. We develop Dynamic SBM models that can evaluate the overall efficiency of decision making units for the whole terms as well as the term efficiencies.http://www.grips.ac.jp/list/facultyinfo/tone_kaoru

Efficiency Measurement in The Indonesian Commercial Banks By Using Data Envelopment Analysis

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis tingkat efisiensi pada bank-bank umum di Indonesia dengan menggunakan sampel sebanyak 15 bank umum. Analisis efisiensi menggunakan Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) berbasis Linear Programming (LP).Berdasarkan  lima peringkat bank paling efisien, menunjukkan urutan bank paling efisien adalah Bank Central Asia (bank devisa), Citibank (bank asing), Bank Chinatrust Indonesia (bank usaha patungan), Bank Negara Indonesia (bank publik), dan UFJ (bank asing) selama periode 2004-2008.Kata Kunci: Efficiency, Commercial Banks, Data Envelopment Analysi