Efficiency status of a feasible solution in the Multi-Objective Integer Linear Programming problems: A DEA methodology

Efficient solutions in Multi-Objective Integer Linear Programming (MOILP) problems are categorized into two distinct types, supported and non-supported. Many researchers try to gain some conditions to determine whether a feasible solution is efficient, nevertheless there is no attempt to identify the efficiency status of a given efficient solution, i.e. supported and non-supported. In this paper, we first verify the relationships between Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and MOILP and then design two distinct practical procedures: the first one specifies whether or not an arbitrary feasible solution is efficient, meanwhile the second one as the main aim of this study, determines the efficiency status of an efficient solution. Finally, as a contribution of the suggested approach, we illustrate the drawback of Chen and Lu's methodology (Chen and Lu, 2007) which is developed for solving an extended assignment problem. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.