A New Three-Stage Robust Data Envelopment Analysis Model with application in the dairy industry

Subject Areas : International Journal of Data Envelopment Analysis

farhad sanchooli ¹ , Seyed Esmail Najafi ² , farzad Movahedi Sobhani ³

1 - Department of Industrial Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
2 - Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering Group, Faculty of Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
3 - Department of Industrial Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Received: 2021-04-16 Accepted : 2024-12-11 Published : 2024-10-01

Keywords: Network DEA, robust optimization, multi-stage systems, Soyster approach,

Abstract :

Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is a non-parametric mathematical programming technique widely used for evaluating the relative efficiency of homogeneous decision making units (DMUs) that use multiple inputs to produce multiple outputs. The DMUs may consist of several sub-processes that interact and perform various operations. The conventional DEA treats DMUs as "black boxes" and internal structure of the DMU is not taken into consideration. The Network DEA (NDEA) methods are capable of reflecting accurately the DMUs’ internal structure and considered the DMU as a network of interconnected sub-units. On the other hand, many real-world applications face with uncertain data which the optimal solutions of models may even become infeasible and the ranking of DMUs can be invalid. Robust DEA (RDEA) is the last uncertain DEA approach that is applied for performance assessment of DMUs in the presence of uncertain data. In this study we propose a new Robust Network DEA (RNDEA) model. We calculate the efficiency of this model by considering a series of intermediate measures and robust constraints. We present a case study in the dairy industry with three series stages to exhibit the efficacy of the approach and demonstrate the applicability of the proposed model.