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5 – Conclusions and discussions

Conclusions and discussions

TSince the seminal work of Charnes, Cooper, and Rhodes [1] in DEA, there has been an “exponential” growth in the number of journal articles in recent four decades (1978–2016). Until end of 2016, the total number of journal articles reaches 10,300 and the distinct authors reach 11,975 in total. Based on the statistics of journal articles, we found that (1) European Journal of Operational Research, Journal of the Operational Research Society, Journal of Productivity Analysis, Omega and Annals of Operations Research are the most utilized journals in this field while journal of Socio-Economic Planning Sciences has been recognized as the first choice journal for DEA papers with applications in the public sector ; (2) Most of all DEA-related articles have less than 4 authors and the percentage is 94% ; (3) Data Envelopment Analysis (including DEA, or DEA models) are the most used keywords, and Efficiency, decision-making, technical efficiency, linear programming, as well as productivity are second most popular keywords in the existing DEA-related articles ; (4) Environmental efficiency and DDF (including eco-efficiency, undesirable outputs, directional distance function (DDF), environmental efficiency, carbon dioxide emissions, pollution, sustainable development, sustainability, environmental protection), network DEA (including two-stage DEA, efficiency decomposition), benchmarking, bootstrap or bootstrapping, as well as returns to scale (including scale efficiency) are the main fields of current studies. Moreover, we detect agriculture, banking, supply chain, transportation, as well as public policy are the top 5 application fields of DEA with the greatest numbers of journal articles in 2015 and 2016.

References

[1]
A. Charnes, W.W. Cooper, E. RhodesMeasuring the efficiency of decision-making units
Eur J Operat. Res, 2 (6) (1978), pp. 429-444
[2]
G. TavaresA bibliography of data envelopment analysis (1978–2001)
RUTCOR, Rutgers University (2002)
also available at:
http://rutcor.rutgers.edu/pub/rrr/reports2002/1_2002.pdf
[3]
A. Emrouznejad, B.R. Parker, G. TavatesEvaluation of research in efficiency and productivity: a survey and analysis of the first 30 years of scholarly literature in DEA
Socio-Economic Plan Sci, 42 (2008), pp. 151-157
[4]
A. Emrouznejad, E. Thanassoulis
An extensive bibliography of data envelopment analysis (DEA), vol. III: supplement vol. 1 (1997), pp. 1-24
Working Paper 258
[5]
A. Emrouznejad, E. Thanassoulis
An extensive bibliography of data envelopment analysis (DEA), vol. I: working papers (1996), pp. 1-55
Working Paper
[6]
A. Emrouznejad, E. Thanassoulis
An extensive bibliography of data envelopment analysis (DEA), vol. II: journals papers (1996), pp. 1-21
Working Paper
[7]
S. Gattoufi, M. Oral, A. ReismanA taxonomy for data envelopment analysis
Socio-Economic Plan Sci, 38 (2–3) (2004), pp. 141-158
[8]
S. Gattoufi, M. Oral, A. ReismanData envelopment analysis literature: a bibliography update (1996–2001)
Socio-Economic Plan Sci, 38 (2–3) (2004), pp. 122-159
[9]
L.M. SeifordA DEA bibliography (1978–1992)
A. Charnes, W.W. Cooper, A.Y. Lewin, L.M. Seiford (Eds.), Data envelopment analysis: theory, methodology and applications. Boston, USA: Kluwer (1994), pp. 437-469
[10]
L.M. SeifordA bibliography for data envelopment analysis (1978–1996)
Ann Operations Res, 73 (1997), pp. 393-438