Estimating Environmental Efficiency and Economic Losses of Sugar Beet Production in Urmia Lake Basin (Central and Nazlu Chay Districts)

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Agriculture, Urmia University

Abstract

Objectives: The main objectives of this study are to estimate the input-oriented environmental efficiency of sugar beet production in Urmialake basin and the economic loss of its production.
Material and Methods: The statistical population of this study was sugar beet farmers in the Central and Nazlu Chay distrcits of Urmia County, and the required data were collected randomly and through face-to-face interviews with 100 questionnaires from sugar beet producers in 2017-2018. To estimate the environmental efficiency, in which fertilizers and chemical pesticides were considered as detrimental inputs, the stochastic frontier function was used as a Translog functional form. Then, the economic losses of sugar beet production were calculated.
Results: On the base of research findings, the average environmental efficiency was 58%, explaining that producers of sugar beet can keep consumption of other inputs constant, reduce the consumption of chemical inputs (fertilizers and chemical pesticides) by 42% and produce a constant level of product. The estimated average environmental damage value was 5.53 million Rials per hectare. In other words, due to the environmentally inefficient practice of sugar beet farmers, damages equal to 5.53 million Rials are imposed on the society through environmental polluting.
Suggestions: It is recommended to adopt appropriate policies that can limit the use of fertilizers and chemical pesticides in the production of sugar beet, which will reduce production costs and farmers will benefit from this way.

Keywords

References

Aigner DJ, Lovell CAK, and Schmidt P. 1977. Formulation and Estimation of Stochastic Frontier Production Function Models. Journal of Econometrics, 6: 21-37.
Anonymous. 2019. Agricultural Statistics Yearbook. Online at:  amar.org.ir
Babaei M, Paknezhad H, Mardani M and Salarpour M. 2013. Investigating Efficiency of Jahrom District Crops Using Interval Data Envelopment Analises. Journal of Operational Research and Its Applications Journal Of Applied Mathematics, 9(4 (35)): 43-53. (In Persian).
Bibi Z, Khan D and ul Haq I. 2021. Technical and Environmental Efficiency of Agriculture Sector in South Asia: A Stochastic Frontier Analysis Approach. Environment, Development and Sustainability, 23(6), 9260-9279.
Bravo-Ureta BE and Rieger L. 1991. Dairy Farm Efficiency Measurement Using Stochastic Frontiers and Neoclassical Duality. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 73(2): 421–428.
Brazdik F. 2006. Non-Parametric Analysis of Technical Efficiency, Factors Affecting Efficiency of West Java Rice Farms. Working Paper Series (286), (ISSN 1211-3298).
Dashti G, Yavari S, Pishbahar E and Hayati B. 2012. Effective Factors on the Broiler Firms' Technical Efficiency of the Sonqor-Kolyaee County. Animal Science Researches, 21(3):83-95. (In Persian).
Dashti Gh, Mohammadpour Z and Ghahremnzadeh M. 2021. Evaluating the Relationship between Economic and Environmental Efficiency in Iranian Agriculture Sector. Journal of Agricultural Science and Sustainable Production, 30(4): 199-211. (In Persian).
Molaei M, Hesari N and Javanbakht O. 2017. The Estimation of Input-Oriented Environmental Efficiency of Agricultural Products (Case Study: Environmental Efficiency of Rice Production), Agricultural Economics, 11(2):157-172. (In Persian).
Esfandiari M, Shahraki J and Karbasi A. 2012. Study of Efficiency and Optimal Inputs Usage for Rice production; Case Study: Rice Producers in Kamfirouz District, Fars Province. Agricultural Economics, 6(3): 1-21. (In Persian).
Eshraghi F and Kazemi F. 2014. Evaluating economic and technical efficiency of dairy farms in Gorgan County. Journal of Ruminant Research, 2(1): 195-211. (In Persian).
Expósito A and Velasco F. 2020. Exploring Environmental Efficiency of the European Agricultural Sector in the Use of Mineral Fertilizers. Journal of Cleaner Production, 253: 119971.
Gelan A, and Muriithi B. 2010. Measuring and Explaining Technical Efficiency of Dairy Farms: A Case Study of Smallholder Farms in East Africa. Conference paper, The 3rd Conference of African Association of Agricultural Economists Africa and the Global Food and Financial Crises, Cape Town, South Africa.
FAO. 2019. FAO Statistical Data. FAOSTAT, online at: http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data.
Gonzales Garcia I. 2007. Land Consolidation in Spain: The Land Registry Perspective. Effective and Sustainable Land Management- A Permanent Challenge for Each Society, Munich, Germany,
May 24-25.
Heriqbaldi U, Purwono R, Haryanto T and Primanthi MR. 2015. An Analysis of Technical Efficiency of Rice Production in Indonesia. Asian Social Science, 11(3): 91-102.
Jafarnia M and Esmaeili A. 2013. Application of environmental impact analysis of technical efficiency: A case study of Shiraz fattening units of beef cattle.  Journal of Agricultural Economics Research, 5(2(18)): 151-164. (In Persian).
Kodde DA and Palm FC. 1986. Wald Criteria for Jointly Testing Equality and Inequality Restrictions. Econometrica, 54(5):1243-1248.
Kumar S and Arora N. 2012. Evaluation of Technical Efficiency in Indian Sugar Industry: An Application of Full Cumulative Data Envelopment Analysis. Eurasian journal of Business and Economics, 5(9):55-78.
Meeusen W and van den Broeck J. 1977. Efficiency Estimation from Cobb-Douglas Production with Composed Error. International Economic Review, 18: 435-444.
Molaei M and Sani F. 2015. Estimating Environmental Efficiency of the Agricultural Sector. Journal of Agricultural Science and Sustainable Production, 25(2): 91-101. (In Persian).
Nguyen BH, Takahashi Y and Yabe M. 2016. Environmental Efficiency and Economic Losses of Vietnamese Tea Production: Implications for Cost Savings and Environmental Protection. Journal-Faculty of Agriculture Kyushu University, 61(2): 383-390.
Norouzian M, Esfandiari M, Hoseyni SM and Musapour Sh. 2019. Evaluating the Environmental Efficiency of Cotton Workers in the Country. Natural Environment Journal, 72(3): 389-402. (In Persian).
Omar MAE. 2014. Technical and Economic Efficiency for Broiler Farms in Egypt. Application of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). Journal of Global Veterinaria, 12(15):588-593.
Rafaati M, Azarinfar Y, Kalayi A and Zad M. 2011. Determination of Technical, Allocative and Economical Efficiency of Cotton Growing Farmers in Tehran Province (Case Study: Varamin), Agricultural Economics, 4(4): 173-198. (In Persian).
Reinhard S, Lovell САK and Thijssen G. 2000. Environmental Efficiency with Multiple Environmentally Detrimental Variables; Estimated with SFA and DEA. European Journal of Operational Research, 121(2): 287-303.
Reinhard S, Lovell САK and Thijssen G. 2002. Analysis of Environmental Efficiency Variation. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 84(4):1054-1065.
Shaban M, Mahmoodi A and Shawkat Fadai M. 2014. A Survey on Technical Efficiency, Marketing and Market Structure of Saffron Crop, Iran. Saffron Agronomy and Technology, 1(2): 85-101. (In Persian).
Shortall OK and Barnes AP. 2013. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Technical Efficiency of Farmers. Ecological Indicators, 29:478-488.
Tu V. 2015. Resource Use Efficiency and Economic Losses: Implications for Sustainable Rice Production in Vietnam. Environment, Development and Sustainability, 19(1): 285-300.
JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE AND SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTION
Volume 32, Issue 3
June 2022
Pages 319-331

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics