International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research Volume 9, Issue 7, July-2018 264 ISSN 2229-5518 IJSER © 2018 http://www.ijser.org Technical Efficiency of Edible Mushroom production farms in Thai Nguyen province, Vietnam Hien Thi Vu 1 , Ke-Chung Peng * , Meidiana Purnamasari 2 Abstract _ Edible mushroom plays an important role in the diet of human as well as an economic field because of its efficiency. The aim of this paper was to measure technical efficiency of edible mushroom production by using Data Envelopment Analysis and Tobit regression model. The results showed that the average of technical efficiency level were 0.567, 0.834 with input-oriented CCR-DEA and BCC-DEA, respectively. In addition, the findings indicated that factors had positive influences on technical efficiency which include age, education and family size. The results suggested that improving educational level of manager’s farms will help them to update and approach new technology in production leading to enhance the efficiency of mushroom production in Thai Nguyen province. Index Terms _ Technical efficiency, Data Envelopment Analysis, Tobit regression model, CCR-DEA, BCC-DEA ——————————  —————————— 1 INTRODUCTION dible mushroom is known as a product using extensively in the diet of human around the world because of their nutritional and medicinal value. Mushrooms are used widely not only as food but also in the area of medicine for human healthy. According to Rathore et al. [20] mushroom has 12000 species in natural environment in which edible mushroom account for 2000 species and nearly 200 species are used for pharmaceutical sector. Moreover, edible mushroom is also considered as a sources of protein-rich food, vitamin, acid folic and minerals like potassium, calcium, phosphorus and magnesium [3], [20]. Besides, edible mushroom cultivation also helps to use efficiently agricultural wastes because the raw materials to produce mushroom almost originated from agriculture and forestry sector such as paddy straw, sawdust, wood, and other cost. In recent years, edible mushroom production is growing increasingly in many regions in the world because of well- adaptability climatic conditions; short growing times; very low cost for production, and easy production technologies [21]. Therefore, the development of edible mushroom cultivation will contribute to create the job, income as well as reduce the poverty rate in the rural area. In Vietnam, since 2012, edible mushroom has been considered as a prioritized commodity for investment and development because of its economic efficiency. Thai Nguyen is a mountainous province, located in the North of Vietnam with the natural area is 354,655, 25 ha [11]. In recent years, Thai Nguyen province issued many policies to support and encourage farms in developing edible mushrooms production. Hence, the number of mushroom producing farms are increasing significantly. However, edible mushroom production households in Thai Nguyen province are facing many difficulties such as small scale production, lack of linkage in production, low price, E ———————————————— • Hien Thi Vu is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Tropical Agriculture and International Cooperation, National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, No.1, Shuefu Road, Neipu, Pingtung. 91201, Taiwan. Email: Vhienquangninh@gmail.com. • Ke-Chung Peng is Professor in the Department of Agribusiness Management, National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, No.1, Shuefu Road, Neipu, Pingtung. 91201, Taiwan. Email: kchung@mail.npust.edu.tw . • Meidiana Purnamasari is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Tropical Agriculture and International Cooperation, National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, No.1, Shuefu Road, Neipu, Pingtung. 91201, Taiwan. Email: meidiana.p@gmail.com. IJSER