Spanish airports: a visual study of management efficiency

• Ane Elixabete Ripoll Zarraga ^[1] ; Cecilio Mar Molinero ^[2]
  1. [1] Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

     Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

     Barcelona, España

     
  2. [2] University of Kent

     University of Kent

     City of Canterbury, Reino Unido

     
• Localización: Notas técnicas: [continuación de Documentos de Trabajo FUNCAS], ISSN-e 1988-8767, Nº. 791, 2017
• Idioma: inglés
• Enlaces
  • Texto completo
• Resumen

  • In recent years the Spanish government has invested significantly in the infrastructure of airports. It is not clear if this investment has been efficiently applied. The Spanish airport system is centralised. Airports operate as independent profit centres but are under the control of a central authority, AENA. This means that, in Spain, non-profitable airports are subsided by profitable airports, and that non-profitable airports are a burden on financial resources. This calls for an assessment of the real reasons behind any inefficiency. We study airport efficiency using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). In standard studies, DEA summarises the efficiency of a unit by means of a single number. Here we go beyond the efficiency score by combining DEA with multivariate analysis techniques. In this way we are able to establish why a particular airport reaches a given efficiency level, and what is its approach to the use of resources and the achievement of results. The combined use of DEA and multivariate statistical analysis permits the visualisation of the results and the addition of qualitative information to the interpretation of the results.