Efficiency Difference Evaluation of Regional Tourism Industry in China: Based on DEA

This paper evaluated the efficiency of tourism industry while considering the existence of normal input, normal output and non-discretionary input. The corresponding DEA model was proposed. The technical efficiency, pure technical efficiency and scale efficiency of tourism industry of 31 provinces in China in the period of 11th five year plan were analyzed, and the efficiency difference was compared. Five findings were obtained, the development of each regional tourism industry is unbalanced and the mean efficiency is low; the inefficiency sources of each regional tourism industry are different, with some resulting from pure technical inefficiency and the others from scale inefficiency; the difference of tourism industry development in all regions is decreased slowly; while the tourism industry development in most regions are smooth, only individual regions are volatile; the differences of tourism efficiencies of three major economic regions (Eastern, Central and Western) are significant.