An Alternative Approach to Efficiency Measurement of Seaports

A whole series of changes in world economic order in the last decade such as globalisation of production and consumption, and structural changes in inter-port relations, port-hinterland relationships and logistics have strengthened the role of ports as nodes in the global transport system. In such an environment, port production economics plays an important role in port management considerations. This paper reviews approaches to performance measurement and provides an examination of the applicability of alternative (four-stage) Data Envelopment Analysis to seaport efficiency measurement. The study finds that alternative DEA is a potentially powerful approach to the evaluation of the overall efficiency of seaports. Maritime Economics & Logistics (2004) 6, 53–69. doi:10.1057/palgrave.mel.9100094