Abstract: This research was conducted aimed at investigating the impacts of tourism on residents' subjective quality of life in tourism target villages of Marvdasht county. The statistical population of this study included 170 heads of households living in the tourism target villages of Marvdasht County, who were selected by simple random sampling method and based on Cochran’s formula. The data gathering tool was a researcher-made questionnaire which its validity and reliability were confirmed. In order to analyze the data, exploratory factor analysis and Morris model were used. The finding of factor analysis showed that the components including cost, local livelihood and asset explain 61.27%, 58.77%, and 58.06 % of total variance of economic dimension of subjective quality of life, respectively. Also social dimension components (including local community and nutrition and health) explain 66.17% and 60.48% respectively; and environmental dimension components (including environmental sustainability and physical) explain 61.28% and 67.87% of total variance of residents' subjective quality of life, respectively. According to the findings, the level of subjective quality of life was medium (with the coefficient of 0.55) based on the Morris method. While the economic (with a coefficient of 0.53) and environmental (with a coefficient of 0.54) dimensions of subjective quality of life were at the medium level; the social dimensions of subjective quality of life (with a coefficient of 0.6) was at favorable level. Therefore, the highest score of the subjective quality of life in the tourism target villages was related to the social index.
Abstract: Changes in competition and environmental uncertainty in recent decades, has led to large and small organizations distancing themselves from traditional marketing practices and turning to entrepreneurial marketing. With its great importance in the industry, marketing and entrepreneurial marketing, inspires the entrepreneur to highlight the importance of entrepreneurial process in creating markets; in this way, entrepreneur identifies, explores, and exploits opportunities and finds markets, and implements subsequent operational strategies as well as strategic decisions (about the methods for serving customer) for market dynamics. On the other hand, as an effective factor in the economic growth of the country, the service and processing industries attract many resources through the provision of services and its optimization to customers. Given the importance of the industry and increasing competitiveness, entrepreneurial marketing plays a very important role in achieving organizational goals and making the most profit in the industry. Entrepreneurial marketing leads to creativity and innovation in the service and processing industries. The present study seeks to develop a comprehensive model of entrepreneurial marketing in service and processing industry and in line with this goal, the meta-synthesis method has been used to analyze the research literature. Then, the experts’ and entrepreneurs’ opinions in the studied industry were classified according to categories and concepts using the Delphi method in two stages. According to the obtained results, the entrepreneurial marketing model consists of three categories of factors (contextual, causal and environmental factors), dimensions (customer-centric perspectives, creativity, risk-taking, innovation, market-oriented and creating opportunities) and consequences.
Abstract: Considering the government’s advocacy of and support for non-oil exports and the importance of cultivation and job creation opportunities relating to the kiwifruit product in the northern provinces, and taking into account the limitations of the mode of distribution and competition of producing countries in the global markets, it is imperative that the preparedness of Amin Caspian Shomal company in exporting kiwifruit in order to enter the global markets and the factors influencing it are investigated. for this descriptive research, which was conducted on the basis of strategic studies process, and is applied in terms of objective and takes on a qualitative approach, the Grounded Theory method and SWOT matrix for the purpose of strategic planning have been used. on the basis of the findings of the research, and after the analysis of the information, the result of the Internal Factors Evaluation matrix was calculated at 2.08 and the External Factors Evaluation matrix was calculated at 2.24, and the strategic position of the Amin Caspian Shomal company was set in a defensive mode.
Abstract: The main purpose of this study is to identify and prioritize the challenges of resistive economics in Iran's agricultural sector. The study used a survey method with a pairwise comparisons questionnaire as the main instrument. Because this study is based on the opinion of experts, 40 experts and senior managers of the Jihad Agricultural Organization of Khouzestan province were studied. The analysis process in this research was a Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP). By exploratory method, the most important criteria and sub-criteria and challenges of resistive economics were identified. The weight of the each criterion was calculated after performing pairwise comparisons in fuzzy hierarchical analysis software and was determined in the following order: Economic flexibility (N) with a weight of 0.558, productivity promotion (T) with a weight of 0.320 and realize dynamic growth (S) with a weight of 0.122. After pairwise comparison of all challenges of implementing resistive economics based on sub-criteria, the results were combined and the final weight and priority of each challenges was identified. In order of priority, the challenges were: insecure economic environment to attract domestic and foreign investment (weight=0.265), low productivity of manpower and capital in agriculture with a weight of 0.198, lack of a coherent marketing and marketing system (weight= 0.132), extensive import versus limited export of products with a (weight= 0.132), low efficiency of agricultural production units (weight= 0.116), high waste of agricultural products (weight= 0.093) and land use change related to agriculture (weight= 0.064).
Abstract: The Dairy industry has a major part in the added value and occupation of the agriculture part. The products of this industry have a significant portion in the Iranian family consumption basket by providing the cheapest protein sources of the country. Because of the importance of this industry, the government has supported the producers and consumers of this industry by adopting different policies and the impact on the components of the dairy market especially milk.The goal of this study is identifying the relationship between the life cycle of the product (the market of the product in the development and maturity stage) through innovation strategies (the tendency for the market and the tendency to the organizational learning) and marketing strategies ( the creation and development of new product). This study was done during March until September in 2018 in the Bazar Gostar Pegah Co. of the region one in the country, which include the provinces such as Gilan, west Azarbayjan, east Azarbayjan, Ghazvin, Zanjan and Ardebil as one of the five regions of the milk industry of Iran (Pegah).The method of the study in terms of the goal is applied, in terms of the data collection is inquiry and field researches. This study is descriptive from the correlation branch. The results of the study show that all the hypothesis of this study are confirmed and the relationship between the variables are positive and meaningful.
Abstract: Shahid Rajaei is a very high potential agro-industry for agricultural production in the Khuzestan region. In this study, the challenges and factors hindering foreign investment in this agro-industrial Shahid Rajaei and in order to be aware of the impact of the challenges extracted from Exploratory factor analysis (which includes technical, economic, infrastructure, socio-cultural challenges, policy-making) on the level of foreign investment in Shahid Rajaei agro-industry and regression analysis were performed according to the quasi-distance scale of variables. Based on the results, it can be said that among the independent variables that have played a significant role on the dependent variable of foreign investment level in Shahid Rajaei agro-industry, three variables: policy factor, technical factor and infrastructure factor are the most important independent variables affecting the research dependent variable that explains 53.5% of the research dependent variable (level of foreign investment in Shahid Rajaei agro-industrial integration).
Abstract: The emergence of agricultural e‐commerce can solve the challenges of agricultural marketing especially in developing countries such as Iran. The aim of this study was to extend the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) through adding the variables social influence and facilitating conditions to understand farmers’ behavioral intention towards using agricultural e-commerce. This descriptive-correlational research was conducted through a cross-sectional survey. The statistical population of the study was Jahrom citrus growers, Iran, (N=3566). The stratified random sampling method was used and 360 respondents selected in the survey. The research instrument was a structured questionnaire, who’s the research instrument was a structured questionnaire, whose face, convergent, and discriminant validity of the questionnaire were confirmed. Cronbach's alpha and composite reliability were obtained using SPSS24 and AMOS24 software, respectively to examine the reliability of research tool (0.75< α< 0.85). The results showed that the extended form of TAM constructs was significant in explaining farmers’ behavioral intention. This means that attitude, perceived usefulness, facilitating conditions, social influence and perceived ease of use explained 50.3% of the variance in behavioral intention. The hypotheses of the extended TAM constructs showed that social influence and facilitating conditions have a positive and significant effect on intention towards using agricultural e-commerce. In this context, the government and agricultural e-commerce planners need to raise the awareness of all social influence groups about the benefits of using agricultural e-commerce through all media. In addition, providing technical and educational e-commerce facilities for farmers is recommended.
Abstract: Energy demand and the factors affecting it have been growing in importance due to population growth, increased greenhouse gas emissions, and limited energy resources. The study of energy consumption in the agricultural sector of Iran shows an increase in the consumption of various energy carriers in this sector in recent years to increase production, employment, and food security. Given the significance of energy resources and environmental protection, the present study aims to investigate the impact of economic and non-economic factors on energy demand in Iran's agricultural sector over the period 1970-2017 using Markov switching-error correction model. The results indicate that the variable of agricultural production in both Markov regimes has a positive and significant effect on energy demand in this sector. The variable of the diversity of agricultural activities affects energy consumption in the agricultural sector positively. Also, the impact of human capital and trade liberalization in the agricultural sector on energy consumption in this sector is positive and significant. It is therefore suggested that to manage and optimize energy consumption, appropriate policies should be implemented in this sector to reduce environmental pollution and prevent the reduction of agricultural production
Abstract: Iran has many critical environmental changes and challenges, especially in agricultural development. These challenges are due to land reform and subsequent modernization. The main purpose of this paper is to analyze the paradigmatic trend of agricultural environmental management of Iran. The study was accomplished through reviewing archival research, different documents and databases worldwide using content analysis. Different global paradigmatic perspectives and strategies in terms of environmental management were reviewed. By reviewing different environmental laws, rules, regulations and activities in Iran, three distinct phases in environmental management including enthusiasm for modernization activities (1962- 1974); concerns about environmental issues (1974- 2005); and crisis of environmental management (2005-present) can be seen. The most important problems contributing to an unsustainable environment in these three phases and the reasons for the failures of macro-policies are addressed. There is an inappropriate paradigm in environmental management thinking of Iran in terms of sustainability as well as an inconsistency between environmental paradigms and strategies in different periods of time. Based on findings, the dominant perspective of environmental management was frontier economics with highly emphasis on economic issues and less considered to ecological problems over time. Thus, environmental degradation increase was occurred and just some sporadic strategies were accomplished by authorities instead of collaborative systematic actions. A basic paradigm shift in environmental activities is necessary from technocentrism toward ecocentrism in order to sustainable agriculture.
Abstract: This study examined the participation of rural youth in mushroom production in the Umuahia Agricultural zone of Abia State, Nigeria. Specifically, the study described the socio-economic characteristics of the respondents and examined their level of participation in mushroom production technology in the study area. Purposive and multi-stage sampling procedures were used in the selection of 60 youths who participated in Mushroom Production Technology Training in Umuahia Agricultural Zone. Data were collected with a structured questionnaire and analyzed with the use of descriptive statistics, while ordinary least square regression analysis was employed to test the hypothesis. The findings show that 58.3% of the respondents were males, 65.0% had tertiary education and 63.3% had 1-4 years experience in mushroom production. Participation in mushroom production was high (mean=3.17). The regression analysis shows that the level of education, household size, years of experience, and level of income of the respondents significantly influenced the level of participation of youth in mushroom production technology in the study area. From the result, the null hypothesis was rejected and the alternate hypothesis was accepted given that the computed F-statistic of 72.136 was significantly higher than the critical F-statistic at 1% level. Based on the results of the study, it could be inferred that the socio-economic characteristics of the respondents influenced their level of participation in mushroom production. The study recommended that government should encourage youths to get involved in mushroom production by relating the production technology information in such a way that they can understand and practice.
Abstract: The relationship between women's empowerment and microfinance has been studied in many countries, including Iran. But few studies have examined the impact of women's microfinance consumption path on their empowerment. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to answer the important question of what effect the path of microcredit consumption has on women's empowerment. Given the importance of the type of loan used in the women economic empowerment, 13 ways of spending by women were identified. These routes can be divided into three general paths: (1) start a small business, (2) indirect investment with the possibility of return (3) spending the loan without the possibility of its return. The main question is how much women are empowered if they choose each of these paths' The statistical population of this study consisted of 800 women in Nahavand Township. Sample size was determined according to Krejcie and Morgan table and 260 persons were selected and stratified sampling was done with proportional assignment. Questionnaire's reliability and validity confirmed respectively through computing Cronbach's alpha coefficient (more than 0.7) and content validity. Data analyzed by SPSS20 software. The results showed that women in first path became more empowered than the other two groups. Choosing the second path, although caused women a little more empowered than the third group, they does not make a significant difference in their level of the empowerment with the third group. It is imperative that credit-paying institutions exercise greater control over how women use their credit by fundamentally reviewing payment laws.
Abstract: Today, export development is a way of generating a recovery economy. Almost in all of the developing countries; the issue of export development is at the top of the government's priorities and policies, as there is awareness and attention to the nature of the issue of exports in developed countries. Under these circumstances, companies are trying in different ways to sell their goods and services around the world and maximize their profits. The present study has a qualitative-exploratory approach and the method of GT has been used as a research method. The tools of this research are semi-structured interviews. The participants of this research are 18 academic experts, experts in the field of export, managers and experts of the companies that were sampled by snowball sampling in the period of 2019. By analyzing the data of the interviews in the research, developing resistive export as the axial category; the causal conditions include economic foresight, export supports and the necessity to fulfill the macro-policies of the resistive economy; interferer conditions include business diplomacy, conditions of economic sanctions, and the role of government; ground factors include technological and up-to-date production, competitive organizational climate, efficient supply chain logistics and dynamic contribution of employees; strategies include designing an export-oriented marketing strategy document, enabling knowledgeable human assets, architecting trade negotiations and business intelligentization; consequences include competitive power, economic resilience, economic growth and production, and employment boom.
Abstract: — Nutrition is recognized as both an input to and a result of sustainable development, where agricultural production also plays an undeniable role. Alborz, one of the major provinces of Iran, faces several issues that have been adversely affecting its food security over the years and implementation of nutrition-sensitive agriculture has deemed to be a necessity to alleviate these problems. The research in hand investigates the interventions affecting the implementation of nutrition-sensitive agriculture production in Alborz province and structures a multiple-criteria decision making (MCDM) analysis to prioritize these interventions, as well as identifying the best implementation strategy to be followed in the area of the study. To achieve this goal, the Analytical Network Process (ANP) has been employed. Based on library and documentary studies and interviews with experts and authorities, the structure of the ANP model has been developed and pairwise comparisons have been made. Results indicate that income generation for nutrition is the most important intervention, followed by nutrition-sensitive post-harvest handling, storage and processing. Decision makers and authorities should dedicate more attention to these aspects in the implementation of nutrition-sensitive agriculture in Alborz province. Also, a long term (6-20 years) implementation strategy has found to be a better alternative to target and plan for by the decision-makers and authorities.
Abstract: Sandstorms or dust are among the most important factors in reducing crop yields. Accordingly, in the present study it was attempted to evaluate economic losses of dust on crop yields in Khuzestan province of Iran. For this purpose, study data were collected using a questionnaire from farmers in Khuzestan province, and factors affecting willingness to pay for preventing damages due to dust were identified using logit model and calculated using the final probability and elasticity to determine the role and contribution of each of these factors on the probability of willingness to pay. Finally, using estimated models, economic crop damages were determined. Therefore, the results of damage estimation in three properties affected by dust, involving crop quality, crop quantity and works recess, were evaluated. The estimated damage values for above properties are 1.673, 1.325, 0.550 million Rials, respectively. Therefore, total damages was estimated to be 3.550 million Rials. On the other hand, the number of operators willing to pay were 330378 people. The total estimated damages due to above three properties was 1173000 million Rials
Abstract: Precision agriculture has a great potential to increase crop yield, cost reduction and environment protection, while adoption of these technologies faced barriers that is essential to be recognized. Using a sample of 142 agricultural experts, this survey was conducted to identify experts’ perceptions towards barriers to the adoption of precision agriculture in Ardabil province, Iran. A questionnaire was used as data collection tool. It was validated by a group of university staffs. A pilot study was conducted using 30 experts and the alpha value showed high reliability of the instrument. Due to the prevalence of Covid 19, the data were collected virtually. The results showed that the experts had relatively good knowledge about precision agriculture. Five factors i.e., lack of knowledge, economic barriers, weak extension-farmer interactions, data security problems, and inaccessibility accounted for 73.34% of the total variance of barriers to the adoption of precision agricultural technologies. Based on the results some consideration were presented to remove the barriers.
Abstract: Abstract The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of environmental quality and social capital on economic growth in Iran. So, this study, based on theoretical foundations, in addition to these variables, investigated the effects of various human capital indicators on Iran's economic growth during the period of 1973-92. The variables representing social capital included access to the Internet and telephone communication services. For human capital, literacy rate, enrollment rate in elementary school, as well as the number of students were used. It was also assumed that technology, in addition to workforce, would appear in the form of physical capital. The findings showed that physical capital was the most important factor in the growth of Iran's economy and its yield was 0.3-0.4. But a very small role was played by the variables of human capital and environmental capital. The role of social capital was also relatively acceptable and positive. Keywords: Growth Model, Social Capital, Environmental Capital, Iran JEL Classification: O13, O47, R1
Abstract: Sustainable agricultural and rural development requires knowledge and information, skills, attitudes and technologies, which run through a network of actors to produce, distribute and use it in a particular place. The model of the Agriculture Knowledge and Information Systems (AKIS) is designed based on this recognition. In Iran, There are about decades of experience in the development of this system. The purpose of this Delphi study was to develop a listing of those challenges facing Iran's Agricultural Knowledge and Information System (AKIS). Panel of experts consisted of extension offices, natural-level researchers, faculty members of Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization (AREEO), and university faculty in agricultural extension and education. The panel identified 86 challenges of AKIS in Iran that were classified into 8 categories consisting of Participatory-institutional, Policy-legal, Information broadcasting-communicational, Monitoring and evaluation, Actors competency, supportive-motivational, management-structural and infrastructure-environmental.
Abstract: This paper aims at studying the role of agricultural education and extension methods on the use of renewable energy by farmers in Semnan Province. The research was a practical study in terms of goal and was a descriptive-correlation study in terms of methodology. The population of the study was composed of Semnan Province poultry farmers that used any type of renewable energy. In total, 89 people were analyzed. Data collection tool was questionnaire (composed of 29 main questions and 108 minor questions in a Likert scale). The questionnaire was designed after consultations with university professors and research literature. The validity of the questionnaire was measured in terms of the form and content and its reliability was tested with Cronbach's alpha which ranged from 0.801 to 0.925. It was found that there was a strong significant relationship (r = 0.773) between education and extension methods (participation in the extension and educational courses, visits to farms using solar power, holding workshops on agricultural extension centers, experts’ visiting of poultry, watching videos of farms that use solar energy, production and distribution of educational brochures among farmers, designing related programs at universities, watching videos of the construction of solar power farms, broadcasting radio programs and educational broadcasting from local TV channels) and the use of solar energy by farmers. Based on the farmer’s view, participation in the extension and educational courses was the main source for obtaining the needed information. Also according to stepwise regression, 78.5% of the change in the dependent variable was explained by the variables of “visiting farms using solar power”, “participation in the extension and educational courses”, “production and distribution of educational brochures among farmers”, “holding workshops on agricultural extension centers” and “experts’ visiting of poultry”.
Abstract: The purpose of the present research is to examine the effect of coating the tertiary irrigation canals on farmers’ satisfaction in Sowme’eh Sara, Guilan. The study was conducted using a survey research methodology. The statistical population included 14 tertiary canalized schemes in Sowme’eh Sara up to the end of 2013, Including totally 2434 hectares .The share of each beneficiary was 0.7 hectare according to the extant statistics and documents in water and soil management of Agricultural Jihad Organization of Guilan. Based on Morgan and Krejcie’s Table, 340 beneficiaries were chosen by stratified random sampling. The main data collection tool was a self-made questionnaire whose face and content validity was improved and finally accepted by water and soil experts and professors. In order to determine the reliability of the research, the questionnaires were answered by 30 members of the statistical population. Afterwards, using SPSS software and Cronbach’s alpha test, the questionnaire’s sustainability was assessed and 78% was computed and confirmed. The independent variables under study were age, literacy, the number of individuals under guardianship, workload, product performance, costs, securing agricultural goals etc. and the dependent variable was farmers’ satisfaction of coating the streams. Each of the variables was categorized and assessed based on Likert Scale. The effect of each independent variable on farmers’ satisfaction was evaluated through SPSS software and Spearman’s rank correlation. The results showed that there is a semantic relationship between literacy, workload, product performance, costs and securing agricultural goals variables and farmers’ satisfaction.
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to designing an Information Management Model for Entrepreneurship Education in Rural Areas of Ilam Province The methodology of the study was descriptive using Delphi technique. Purposive sampling was used in this study and 15 experts including faculty members, managers and experts were selected and participated in three stages of Delphi research. In the third round of Delphi, the final model consisted of seven components (data collection, data storage, data quality control, data analysis, information dissemination, documentation and information sharing and utilization) and 22 sub-components were approved by experts. The results showed that in order to apply the entrepreneurial education information management system, it is necessary to identify the required information (economic, social, cultural, infrastructure, ecological, etc.) in rural areas. To store information, data should be entered into a system designed to manage the entrepreneurship education information system. Also, according to the results of this study, quality control, analysis, dissemination, documentation and exchange of entrepreneurship education system data will be done by the Office of Coordination of Economic Affairs of the Governor.
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