Estimating Environmental Efficiency for Agricultural Production: A Case Study of Rice
Abstract
The paper introduced a methodology to estimate environmental efficiency for agricultural production by applying stochastic frontier analysis. The results estimated from this method are reliable and applicaple in reality because the method can separate noise effects from deterministic frontier and ensures the independent distribution of technical and environmental efficiency scores. The so-called environmental efficiency was defined as the ability to reduce environmentally detrimental inputs while keeping other observed inputs and output level constant. The environmental efficiency is a promising and empirical indicator for producers, consumers and decision makers to arrive atproper solutions or interventions that promote the harmonious development respecting the environment. The paper also provided an example of 199 rice farmers in An Giang province in 2014 to demonstrate the detailed steps of the measurement. The results showed that the average technical efficiency and environmental efficiency were 93.16% and 77.70%, respectively. In all cases, the environmental efficiency scores were smaller than those of the technical efficiency.