Saaty's AHP with inner dependent hierarchy and the choice of key industries

In China, the choice of key industries (KI) is one of the most important issues for administrative authorities and is also an important topic in economics. In China, this task is carried out in two ways: one is on the basis of decision-maker's own experiences; the other is based on criteria raised by economics. Both methods are far from satisfactory. The author has used the simple analytical hierarchy process (AHP) created by Prof. Saaty (1987) to choose KI; therefore the shortcomings in the above-mentioned two methods are remedied. However, in the AHP model, the influences of the one-to-one input-output relationships between the industries on the choice of KI are not reflected adequately. In this paper, AHP models with inner dependent hierarchies, in which the dependent relationships between industries are considered, are built up to choose KI. The corresponding formulae are derived and the choice of Guangzhou KI is made by using these models. The calculated results, based on the models, have been approved and adopted by the Guanzhou municipal authorities.<>