Optimization of energy consumption for rose production in Iran

Efficient use of energy in agriculture is one of the conditions for sustainable production. In the present study energy use pattern for rose production in Iran was investigated and a non-parametric data envelopment analysis (DEA) technique was applied to analyze the technical and scale efficiencies of farmers with respect to energy use for crop production. For this purpose, the data were collected by random method from 29 rose production field in the region by using a questionnaire. The results indicated that total input energy, total output energy and energy ratio for rose production were 67.9 GJ ha− 1, 11.8 GJ ha− 1 and 0.17, respectively. The study has helped to segregate efficient farmers from inefficient ones, identify wasteful uses of energy from different sources by inefficient farmers and to suggest reasonable savings in energy uses from different sources. DEA optimizes the performance measure of each rose production farm. Specifically, the DEA was used to compare the performance of each farm in region of increasing, constant or decreasing return to scale in multiple-inputs situations. The results of DEA application revealed that of the average pure technical, technical and scale efficiencies of farmers were 0.83, 0.68 and 0.79, respectively. By optimization of energy consumption in rose production energy use efficiency was increased to 0.31. Also the results revealed that by adopting the recommendations based on the present study, on an average, about 43.59% of the total input energy could be saved without reducing the rose yield.

► This article discriminates efficient rose producers from inefficient ones.
► Data envelopment analysis was applied to analyze the technical and scale efficiencies.
► The average PTE, TE and SE of farmers were 0.83, 0.68 and 0.79, respectively.
► 43.59% of the total input energy could be saved without reducing the rose yield.