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In this article, by looking at the statistical data of 24 countries in Middle East and Asia, being the members of union International des Chemins Defer (UIC) and Organization for Cooperation of Railways for a period of 5 years from 2000 Up to 2004, the efficiency and productivity of the railways of those countries, have been examined by using Malemquist Index based on the Technique of Data Development Analysis. The line of distinction between this article and the former ones is exactly the usage of the above index which can be used for measuring changes in efficiency, that is, efficiency under conditions of constant and changeable returns to scale.
The average technical efficiency of the Iranian Railways system under CCR condition is equal to 0.590 and BCC condition equals 0.6. Furthermore, in all approaches for ranking Iranian railways, there has been no better ranking than" eleven" in terms of efficiency which belongs to the "Iranian Railways System".
JEL Classification : L92, C61, C14