Technical efficiency and productivity change of dairy farms: a comparison of France and Hungary

JEL: Q12 ; D24 ; C6The paper investigates the difference in technical efficiency, productivity and technology between French and Hungarian dairy farms during 2001-2004, using Data Envelopment Analysis with separate and a common frontier. Results indicate that Hungarian farmers are more clustered to their own frontier than French farms are, but are as scale efficient. Both samples have a slight technological progress over the period. Comparing the technology of both countries reveals that Hungarian farms have a superior technology. Under a common hypothetical technology, Hungarian farms would be the leaders but it seems that this leadership is reduced in 2004, raising question on the adequacy of the EU agricultural policy for large-scale dairy farming