Efficiency of rice farming households in Vietnam

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to estimate technical efficiency obtained from both data envelopment analysis (DEA) and stochastic frontier approaches using household survey data for rice farming households in Vietnam.

Design/methodology/approach

A bootstrap method is used to provide statistical precision of the DEA estimator. Technical efficiency is modeled as a function of household and production factors.

Findings

The results from the deterministic, semi‐parametric and parametric approaches indicate that among other things, technical efficiency is significantly influenced by primary education and regional factors. In addition, scale efficiency analysis shows that many farms in Vietnam are operating with less than optimal scale of operation.

Originality/value

The study is among the first that employ a bootstrap method and compare estimates from both Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and stochastic frontier approaches.

Citation

Hoang Linh, V. (2012), "Efficiency of rice farming households in Vietnam", International Journal of Development Issues, Vol. 11 No. 1, pp. 60-73. https://doi.org/10.1108/14468951211213868