ISO 9000 certification and technical efficiency of foreign‐financed manufacturing firms in southern China

Godfrey Yeung and Vincent Mok

Journal of Economic Studies, 2008, vol. 35, issue 5, 385-404

Abstract: Purpose - Based on a sample of foreign‐financed manufacturing firms in southern China, the purpose of this paper is to study the effects of ISO certification on productivity. Design/methodology/approach - The paper employs the stochastic frontier approach to estimate frontier efficiency scores at firm level. Findings - The empirical results suggest that the implementation of ISO was able to improve firms' productivity in the form of a wholly disembodied shift of the production frontier. The results further show that there was a mildly positive embodied shift of the production frontier due to the effects of ISO on the marginal product of labor. However, the embodied effects of ISO on the marginal product of capital were not significant. Research limitations/implications - The sample size is small and the data were collected from southern China. A generalization of results to other parts of China should be interpreted with caution. Despite the limited degree of generalization, firms with ISO certifications are suggested to be aware of certain flexibility in the implementation of the ISO documented procedures. Practical implications - The findings of the paper should be of general interest to firms seeking or adopting ISO system or other international standards. Originality/value - The originality of the paper resides in the fact that the empirical work investigates the embodied effects of ISO certification on the marginal product of labor and capital.

Keywords: Process efficiency; ISO 9000 series; Manufacturing industries; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:jespps:v:35:y:2008:i:5:p:385-404

DOI: 10.1108/01443580810903545

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Economic Studies is currently edited by Prof Mohsen Bahmani-Oskooee

More articles in Journal of Economic Studies from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().