State Road Transport Undertakings, 1983-84 to 1996-97 : A Multilateral Comparison of Total Factor Productivity

This study is based on twenty-one State Road Transport Undertakings (STUs), which are selected on the basis of availability of data and volume of their operation. Output (measured in terms of pass.-kms) produced by the sample STUs are usually more than 80 percent of the produced output of all the STUs through out the sample period. This paper estimates the growth and relative levels of productivity (measured in terms of total factor productivity) for the STUs for the period 1983-84 to 1996-97 using index number approach. This paper also tries to investigate the sources of growth and differences in levels of productivity using regression analysis. Estimates of total factor productivity are also compared with more traditional indicators of transport productivity e.g., revenue pass.-kms per employee, and available pass.-kms per employee. Productivity indexes are also computed for the passenger road transport industry to evaluate the productivity growth in the industry for the period 1983-84 to 1996-97