Environmental factors add complexity to the comparison between specific activities or entire entities. Decision making units with an inferior performance are tempted to invoke that their organization is different from the others in the data set. By reinterpreting and extending the metafrontier...

This paper proposes a new two-step stochastic frontier approach to estimate technical efficiency (TE) scores for firms in different groups adopting distinct technologies. Analogous to Battese et al. (J Prod Anal 21:91–103, <CitationRef CitationID="CR4">2004</CitationRef>), the metafrontier production function allows for calculating...</citationref>

The aim of this paper is to provide a technical efficiency assessment of Taiwan’s incineration plants as the basis of incentive regulation schemes. We integrate the four-stage approach with Simar and Wilson’s (in J Econom 136:31–64, <CitationRef CitationID="CR32">2007</CitationRef>) double bootstrapping to filter out the impacts of...</citationref>

A canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) for environmental and economic variables was performed for 17 Mexican coastal states. The ordination method allowed us to identify three groups, namely hydroelectric energy generation (I), pollution (II) and harbours (III), which were associated to...

This paper discusses a new approach to controlling for the environment when estimating efficiency. In response to the literature on the international comparison of bank efficiency, we draw the attention to a local dimension of comparison. By introducing geographical weights and estimating local...