Analysis of the relationship between science and technology inputs and economic growth in China based on DEA (ID: 1-033)

Economic growth is a very important development issue and contributes to the entire economic and social improvement of a country. In China, as the emergence of the knowledge economy, technological factors are playing increasingly influential role in the economic growth of the country. Science and technology (S&T) inputs have become important factor in China's economic growth. This paper evaluates the relative technical efficiency and aggregate technical and scale efficiency of science and technology (S&T) inputs of 30 provincial regions in China, by means of mathematical programming formulations, when some of the inputs or. outputs are exogenously fixed and beyond the discretionary control of DUM(S) The aims are to discuss the output efficiency of S&T input in China Structural adjustment is proposed for regions that return to scale are increasing to reach aggregate technical and scale efficiency. The results show that S&T inputs in 14 regions are technical efficiency as they fully exploit the S&T input resource; and 10 regions are aggregate technical and scale efficiency including both developed regions in the Eastern and developing regions in the Western implying that output efficiency of economic growth are both optimal in the Eastern and Western regions, though the input intensity is different. For 7 regions that are technical inefficiency but return to scale is increasing, suggestions to adjust the input structure to reach aggregate technical and scale efficiency are provided.