Multicriteria Method in Data Envelopment Analysis: an application to measure the performance of the instrument of charging for water in the State of Ceará basins

ABSTRACT The water policies adopt management instruments, among which the charge for water use stands out. Because there are many factors that can be used in an analysis of the efficiency of this management instrument in a watershed, it is necessary to use a scientific methodology for multi-criteria analysis. The aim of this study was to analyze the performance of charging for the use of raw water in the river basins of Ceará State in the main categories of use (industrial, supply and irrigation) using the methodology for data envelopment analysis (DEA) and the BBC model, with the help of computational tool SIAD (Integrated System for Decision Support) to designate the most and the least efficient units in order to improve the management of these resources. In this study, the industry units stood out, shwoing an average efficiency of 57.67%, followed by the public supply with an average efficiency of 22.69% and irrigation with an average efficiency of 11.78%. The charge for the use of water in the Litoral basin, in the industrial sector, stood out as the most efficient unit of the whole study, as the least efficient unit was the basin of the Litoral, in the irrigation sector.