Xiaoxing Liang and Zhixiang Zhou
With the rapid economic growth and urbanization development, regional environmental problems have attracted increasing attention. The study on analyzing cities’ capacity on…
Abstract
Purpose
With the rapid economic growth and urbanization development, regional environmental problems have attracted increasing attention. The study on analyzing cities’ capacity on resource utilization and environmental protection is practically significant because of the industrial agglomeration in an urban area. This study aims to measure environmental efficiency of urban industrial water utilization by comparing input, output and undesirable outputs variables of cities.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper combines data envelopment analysis basic approach with regression to discover the environmental efficiency score of cities and their influence factors. A set of slack-based measure (SBM) model is constructed for calculating the environmental efficiency score by considering both desirable and unendurable outputs.
Findings
This paper analyzes the industrial water utilization efficiency for China from the city level by evaluating the performance for up to 200 mainland Chinese cities during 2012–2016 under SBM model. Then, 2C Tobit regression is used to measure the determining factors of industrial water utilization efficiency from the angle of natural, social, municipal and industrial structure factors. The empirical study results show huge room for improvement in industrial water utilization in China, while the average citizen efficiency scores maintain a level of about 0.5.
Originality/value
Significant differences exist in the regional efficiency in different cities in China. Per capita GDP, a total length of drainage pipe and whether the area is coastal or not have significant positive impacts on the water utilization efficiency, while the proportion of secondary industry to GDP has a significant negative influence. Specific recommendations are proposed based on the local industrial water utilization efficiency scores, such as improving urban infrastructure and adopting a more flexible water pricing system.
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Meiqiang Wang, Yingwen Chen and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this paper is to examine the industrial production efficiency, pollution treatment efficiency, total factor energy efficiency and water efficiency in China with the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the industrial production efficiency, pollution treatment efficiency, total factor energy efficiency and water efficiency in China with the consideration of technological innovation. This study also explores the distribution proportion of technological innovation between industrial production substage and pollution treatment substage.
Design/methodology/approach
A nonparametric method, data envelopment analysis (DEA), is used as the model foundation of this study. Specifically, a novel two-stage range-adjusted measure (RAM-DEA) with shared inputs is constructed to analyze the China’s industrial system. In this study, the panel data of 30 provinces from 2008 to 2015 are used.
Findings
This study found that although the current environmental regulation reduced the efficiency of industrial production, it could significantly improve the pollution treatment level. However, the lack of pollution treatment capacity was still an obstacle for development of China's industrial system. Compared with the total factor energy efficiency, the total factor water efficiency had more room for improvement. The optimal distribution of technological innovation in the two substages performed little change and the distribution roughly followed the “three-seven principle”.
Practical implications
More attention should be paid to improve the pollution treatment level and total factor water efficiency. And more R&D expenditure should be used in the industrial production substage in the eastern coastal areas, while in the inland areas, more R&D expenditure should be used in the pollution treatment substage.
Originality/value
This study proposed a model to environmental efficiency score with considering interval data under two-stage evaluation structure, which could strengthen the theory and expand the application scope of DEA approach.
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Jie Wu, Qingsong Liu and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the profit efficiency of decision-making units (DMUs) based on predicted future information to solve the lag problem of improvement…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the profit efficiency of decision-making units (DMUs) based on predicted future information to solve the lag problem of improvement benchmarks given by the traditional profit efficiency model.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper proposes a two-step profit efficiency evaluation method. The first step predicts the future input and output information of DMUs through the past time-series data, obtaining a likely production possibility set (PPS) and profit frontier for the next period. The second step calculates DMUs' profit efficiency based on the predictions obtained in the first step and provides predictive benchmarking for DMUs.
Findings
The empirical results show that the proposed method yields good solutions for the lag problem of benchmarks given in ex-post evaluation, enabling bank managers to use predicted future information to achieve better improvement. Besides, compared with the technical efficiency measure, profit efficiency can better reflect the financial situation of DMUs and give the specific gap between the evaluated and optimal DMU.
Practical implications
For bank managers, the authors' new technique is advantageous for grasping the initiative of development because this technique accounts for the future development of the whole industry and sets forward-looking targets. These advantages can help banks improve in a more favorable direction and improve the asset management ability of banks.
Originality/value
This paper combines the data envelopment analysis (DEA) profit efficiency model with performance prediction and proposes a new two-step profit efficiency model, filling a gap in previous studies.
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Guangcheng Xu and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Chinese commercial banks efficiency based on different non-performing loans in the process. Moreover, we identified the difference among…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to evaluate Chinese commercial banks efficiency based on different non-performing loans in the process. Moreover, we identified the difference among different types of banks (state-owned commercial banks, joint-stock commercial banks and city commercial banks) and different operation stages (deposit producing sub-stage, profit earning sub-stage and overall stage).
Design/methodology/approach
Assurance region (AR) restrictions are combined with a two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) model. The efficiency scores of 26 Chinese commercial banks (listed banks) are analyzed by a two-stage AR-DEA model in the study period of 2013–2017.
Findings
The results show that state-owned commercial banks had better performance than joint-stock commercial banks and city commercial banks over the five-year study period. The development of Internet finance has positive impact on deposit producing sub-stage and insignificant non-homogeneity existed among the different groups in the circumstances of considering different non-performing loans.
Practical implications
The research findings provide practical insights that help bank managers find the defects in operation process, which need to be improved.
Originality/value
Previous studies viewed non-performing loans as an integrated whole variable. The paper divides non-performing loans into three categories based on the risk and investigates the effect of different types of loans on bank efficiency scores.
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Jie Wu, Chu Wang and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this paper is to improve the accuracy of evaluation efficiency by constructing parallel structures considering the main components of industrial pollutants, and…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to improve the accuracy of evaluation efficiency by constructing parallel structures considering the main components of industrial pollutants, and then to consider some external influence factors to eliminate random errors.
Design/methodology/approach
In this paper, data transformation has been used to deal with undesirable output, and a model with a parallel structure based on the three-stage data envelopment analysis model to calculate the efficiency scores of different division in pollution treatment has been composed.
Findings
The analysis shows that the external environmental factors and random factors of the economy and society greatly affect the efficiency of industrial pollutant treatment; moreover, there is an imbalance between regions in China in the treatment of industrial pollutants.
Originality/value
Optimal improvement requires each province to take targeted measures to improve its efficiency of pollutant treatment measures, which are tailored to specific situations and determined by efficiency analysis in this paper.
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Jie Wu, Wanting Zhang and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this paper is to study where to place industrial solid waste treatment centers among the 16 prefecture-level cities under its jurisdiction.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to study where to place industrial solid waste treatment centers among the 16 prefecture-level cities under its jurisdiction.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper adopts the cross-efficiency data envelopment analysis (DEA) model, with the industrial land price and average annual salary per capita as inputs, while coverage, total transportation distance, number of industrial enterprises and total amount of industrial solid waste are used as outputs.
Findings
Based on the spatial efficiency scores calculated by using the new presented models, the authors find that the most efficient construction site are Chizhou, Chuzhou, Suzhou and Bengbu. That is quite different from the results obtained by using traditional approach.
Originality/value
This paper evaluates the spatial efficiency by using combinations of the four locations as the decision-making units of the DEA model, which could be used as an objective way to allocate limited resource. In addition to the resource allocation of the industrial solid waste treatment center, the method in this paper can also be applied to other spatial aspects of resource allocation.
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Jie Wu, Henry Tsai and Zhixiang Zhou
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the operational efficiency of 23 four‐ and five‐plum international tourist hotels (ITHs) in Taipei in 2006, paying attention to efficiency…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the operational efficiency of 23 four‐ and five‐plum international tourist hotels (ITHs) in Taipei in 2006, paying attention to efficiency improvement using a non‐radial data envelopment analysis (DEA) model.
Design/methodology/approach
A non‐radial DEA model is proposed to improve the efficiency of inefficient hotels focusing on the output side by allowing for non‐proportional reductions in each positive input or augmentations in each positive output. The model considers four inputs (total number of rooms, total number of employees, food and beverage (F&B) capacity, and total operating cost) and three outputs (guest room revenues, F&B revenues, and other revenues); variable returns to scale are assumed.
Findings
The empirical results show that the radial and non‐radial DEA models provide not only different performance measurements for the corresponding hotels but also different benchmarks from different angles for improving efficiency.
Practical implications
Hoteliers or other service providers should find this alternative DEA model helpful and more flexible in re‐examining their resource utilization and possibly reshuffling their resource pool.
Originality/value
Unlike traditional DEA studies, which focus on measuring efficiency while ignoring differences among input or output variables, this study pays attention to efficiency improvement by considering changes in output with non‐proportional augmentations to improve efficiency.
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Tao Liu, Zhixiang Fang, Qingzhou Mao, Qingquan Li and Xing Zhang
The spatial feature is important for scene saliency detection. Scene-based visual saliency detection methods fail to incorporate 3D scene spatial aspects. This paper aims to…
Abstract
Purpose
The spatial feature is important for scene saliency detection. Scene-based visual saliency detection methods fail to incorporate 3D scene spatial aspects. This paper aims to propose a cube-based method to improve saliency detection through integrating visual and spatial features in 3D scenes.
Design/methodology/approach
In the presented approach, a multiscale cube pyramid is used to organize the 3D image scene and mesh model. Each 3D cube in this pyramid represents a space unit similar to a pixel in the image saliency model multiscale image pyramid. In each 3D cube color, intensity and orientation features are extracted from the image and a quantitative concave–convex descriptor is extracted from the 3D space. A Gaussian filter is then used on this pyramid of cubes with an extended center-surround difference introduced to compute the cube-based 3D scene saliency.
Findings
The precision-recall rate and receiver operating characteristic curve is used to evaluate the method and other state-of-art methods. The results show that the method used is better than traditional image-based methods, especially for 3D scenes.
Originality/value
This paper presents a method that improves the image-based visual saliency model.
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Yang Li, Zhicheng Zheng, Yaochen Qin, Haifeng Tian, Zhixiang Xie and Peijun Rong
Drought is the primary disaster that negatively impacts agricultural and animal husbandry production. It can lead to crop reduction and even pose a threat to human survival in…
Abstract
Purpose
Drought is the primary disaster that negatively impacts agricultural and animal husbandry production. It can lead to crop reduction and even pose a threat to human survival in environmentally sensitive areas of China (ESAC). However, the phases and periodicity of drought changes in the ESAC remain largely unknown. Thus, this paper aims to identify the periodic characteristics of meteorological drought changes.
Design/methodology/approach
The potential evapotranspiration was calculated using the Penman–Monteith formula recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, whereas the standardized precipitation evaporation index (SPEI) of drought was simulated by coupling precipitation data. Subsequently, the Bernaola-Galvan segmentation algorithm was proposed to divide the periods of drought change and the newly developed extreme-point symmetric mode decomposition to analyze the periodic drought patterns.
Findings
The findings reveal a significant increase in SPEI in the ESAC, with the rate of decline in drought events higher in the ESAC than in China, indicating a more pronounced wetting trend in the study area. Spatially, the northeast region showed an evident drying trend, whereas the southwest region showed a wetting trend. Two abrupt changes in the drought pattern were observed during the study period, namely, in 1965 and 1983. The spatial instability of moderate or severe drought frequency and intensity on a seasonal scale was more consistent during 1966–1983 and 1984–2018, compared to 1961–1965. Drought variation was predominantly influenced by interannual oscillations, with the periods of the components of intrinsic mode functions 1 (IMF1) and 2 (IMF2) being 3.1 and 7.3 years, respectively. Their cumulative variance contribution rate reached 70.22%.
Research limitations/implications
The trend decomposition and periods of droughts in the study area were analyzed, which may provide an important scientific reference for water resource management and agricultural production activities in the ESAC. However, several problems remain unaddressed. First, the SPEI considers only precipitation and evapotranspiration, making it extremely sensitive to temperature increases. It also ignores the nonstationary nature of the hydrometeorological water process; therefore, it is prone to bias in drought detection and may overestimate the intensity and duration of droughts. Therefore, further studies on the application and comparison of various drought indices should be conducted to develop a more effective meteorological drought index. Second, the local water budget is mainly affected by surface evapotranspiration and precipitation. Evapotranspiration is calculated by various methods that provide different results. Therefore, future studies need to explore both the advantages and disadvantages of various evapotranspiration calculation methods (e.g. Hargreaves, Thornthwaite and Penman–Monteith) and their application scenarios. Third, this study focused on the temporal and spatial evolution and periodic characteristics of droughts, without considering the driving mechanisms behind them and their impact on the ecosystem. In future, it will be necessary to focus on a sensitivity analysis of drought indices with regard to climate change. Finally, although this study calculated the SPEI using meteorological data provided by China’s high-density observatory network, deviations and uncertainties were inevitable in the point-to-grid spatialization process. This shortcoming may be avoided by using satellite remote sensing data with high spatiotemporal resolution in the future, which can allow pixel-scale monitoring and simulation of meteorological drought evolution.
Practical implications
Under the background of continuous global warming, the climate in arid and semiarid areas of China has shown a trend of warming and wetting. It means that the plant environment in this region is getting better. In the future, the project of afforestation and returning farmland to forest and grassland in this region can increase the planting proportion of water-loving tree species to obtain better ecological benefits. Meanwhile, this study found that in the relatively water-scarce regions of China, drought duration was dominated by interannual oscillations (3.1a and 7.3a). This suggests that governments and nongovernmental organizations in the region should pay attention to the short drought period in the ESAC when they carry out ecological restoration and protection projects such as the construction of forest reserves and high-quality farmland.
Originality/value
The findings enhance the understanding of the phasic and periodic characteristics of drought changes in the ESAC. Future studies on the stress effects of drought on crop yield may consider these effects to better reflect the agricultural response to meteorological drought and thus effectively improve the tolerance of agricultural activities to drought events.