Reassessing Efficiency in Human Development among ECOWAS Countries

A country has got higher HDI score, when the life expectancy at birth is longer, the education period is longer, and the income per capita is higher. Therefore the HDI discusses the measurement of human development based on the three main dimensions such as longevity, education and standard of living. In this paper, data envelopment analysis (DEA) is used to evaluate the human development (HD) for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). The aim is to provide complementary information for efficiency measure of HD in ECOWAS countries. ECOWAS region is chosen because of having joint development programs among its member countries. Output-oriented DEA methodology is applied to 15 ECOWAS countries to observe the best practice countries in the regional integration, and provide advices to inefficient ones on the basis of our results.