Journal of Agricultural Economics & Development
Year:2009 | Volume:23 | Issue:1|Papers Count:18

This research was designed to identify the role of ICT in intrapreneurship development in Iranian Agricultural Extension Organization and was implemented as a correlation research. The statistical population of the study was consisted of 2768 extension employees in Iran, One out of each six regional groups of Provinces. (N= 25) was randomly selected and 250 extension workers were randomly selected from theses six provinces based on Cochran’s sampling methodology. The research instrument consisted of three parts in Likert scale. The validity of the questionnaire was analyzed and reliability coefficient was calculated for the questionnaire using Cronbach's alpha ratio of a=0.88 for the first, a=0.92 for the second and a=0.96 for the Tertiary part. These amounts show that questionnaire has a high ability for data gathering. Factor analysis was major statistical method. The gathered data have been analyzed by SPSS15 software. The results showed that from among variables of ICTs related to intrapreneurship development, “managerial support of advanced technology in organization” was at the first priority and “development and Variety in accomplish of activities through more interaction with clients through organizations ICT” located at Last priority in current agricultural extension organization. By use of factor analysis technique, ICTs variables related to intrapreneurship development with regarded to their natures were Shorten to four factors, consisted of, organizational and information content, infrastructure and educational, strategic and individual factors. These 4 factors express 79.83% of the total variances of the variables. 20.17% of Remainder variance is related to the factors or variables which have not been seen in this research. The results of research showed that managerial supports of ICT, development of staffs competency and skills, Plat for ICT in organization and encourage staffs for enhancement of their skills in this case.

Government size plays a vital role in the economic development process. Therefore, in this study, the existence of a non-linear relationship between government size and economic growth was investigated using the two-sector production function developed by Ram (1986). The data, covering 44 years (1961-2005), were collected from the Iranian Economic Information Center. Two classification of government size are examined as threshold variables. The results indicated that current government size in Iran has passed over the optimal government size. Thus, the government expenditure share in gross domestic product should be decrease. Also the existence of a non-linear effectiveness of government size was recognized.

This survey tries to use of competitive advantage analysis of agricultural productions with shift share method. To arrive this target used of official published statistics in ten years priod (1374-1384) were used. The Results explained North khorasan has competitive advantage in onion, melon, tomato and grape production. Also in this survey, appointment potentials of low plant surface production with using of expert viwes and on the basis of Delphi model. The Result of delphy model explained North khorasan has competitive advantage in forage, vegetables, colza, visor, sesame, nectarine, peach, saffron and pharmaceutical plant poduction.

Pesticides, despite their known toxicity, are widely used in developing counties. Evaluating the patterns of their use would be interesting to assess the appropriateness of adequate intervention. In this study, the attitudes associated with pesticides use and exposure was evaluated among greenhouse workers, in Fars province. A standardized quastionnaire was completed by 91 greenhouse workers. The average age of the sample was 31 years and 16.5 % were illiterate. They were divided to three groups: greenhouse labours, managers, and laboursmanagers. Although the majority of respondent considered pesticides to be harmful for human health and environment, pesticides were used without adequate precaution and, control, mainly, due to lack of knowledge regarding alternative ways to control pests and deseases. Personal experience was the main source of information. The results indicated that special educational programs, legislation promoting the use of safer pesticides, introduction of integrated pest management are necessary to decrease harmful effects of pesticide among greenhouse workers in Fars.

Using Tobit model, this study investigated factors affecting on crop risk frequency of farmers in the North Khorasan province. Data was collected through interviewing 120 farmers of North Khorasan province in 2008. Results showed that age, farm ownership and off farm employment affected frequency of risk negatively. Nonagricultural activity, participating in a crop supervisory plan and risk frequency of last year had positive and significant effect on frequency of risk. Age, risk frequency of last year and non- agricultural activity had the most elasticity on frequency of risk, respectively. With respect to result, creation and development agricultural margin employment, e.g. The food processing industry in village, re-training of supervisors to risk terms and management of it, especiall yawareness of crop risk profile and transfer of it to farmers as suggestion introduced.

To get ride of fragile and unsustainable single product export, a comprehensive knowledge of export potential and comparative advantage is required. Agricultural products can be considered as a suitable target for this purpose. For more efficient planning for agricultural products export, proper forecasting is necessary. To achieve this goal, two methods were used and compared. First, an autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) and second, artificial neural networks. For this purpose, the data were received from customhouse from 1961-2006. The data from 1961- 2002 were used for modeling and the last 4 years, were used for examination of forecasting power. Results indicated that artificial neural networks radial basis was more efficient in comparison with other neural networks methods and ARIMA for forecasting the quantity of agricultural products export. Finally, the quantities of agricultural products export forecasted for 2007-2011 by artificial neural networks radial basis.

The aim of this study was to assess the affects of agricultural extension programs on the promotion of the efficiency, knowledge and technical expertise of farmers. The study also aimed to analyze the factors affecting the acceptance of agricultural extension programs with regards to process of agricultural development. A survey consisting of 137 samples was conducted between wheat farmers in Mashhad. The data was collected and statistically analyzed. The LOGIT model was used to study the factors affecting the acceptance of agricultural extension programs between farmers. The results show that agricultural extension promoted the practical and technical knowledge of farmers, which in turn resulted in increased profits in both wheat production in dry-land farming and irrigated systems. The acceptance of agricultural extension programs had positive influences on farmer s actions, views and effeciency. The resultes of the LOGIT model show that there are several factors that reduce the acceptance of agricultural extension programs between farmers. These factors include: age, number of childeren, distance of their home village from the city and their satisfaction in agricultural job and perimeter of their village. In contrast, production, ownership of their land and use of new information and technologies all had a positive affect on the acceptance of agricultural extension programs.

In this study the comparative advantage of wheat in Sistan was investigated by using DRC index and policy analysis matrix (PAM) during 2006-2007. Data were collected from Zabol Agri-Jahad organization and annual foreign trade database. The NPC index showed that there was an indirect tax on producers in all sectors. EPC index represented that there were nonsupport of input and output market in the center sector, but showed effectiveness of government intervention in Miankangi and Poshtab sectors. The NSP index was negative in all sectors. Result supports this idea that Sistan has not comparative advantage in wheat production. But increase in yield, decrease in production cost and improve in cropping pattern are approaches for usefulness of wheat production in Sistan region.

Marketing element’s contrastive behaviors toward price risk had considerable effect on marketing margin in a way that transferring increase in price to final consumer, reduces purchasing power and so consumption amounts of consumers. Present study evaluated effective parameters on marketing margin in 2 level of ranchprocessing and processing- retail of beef and lamb with consideration of risk effect and risky behavior and also demand and supply sides variables from 1997 - 2003. The results revealed that, Also, elasticity of price risk variable (price fluctuation) in slaughterhouse and retail levels respect to farm-slaughterhouse and slaughterhouse-retail marketing margin for beef, equal to 0.51 and 1.78, respectively and for lamb obtained 0.03 and 0.54.

Main objective of this paper is the investigation the effect of support policies of government on income risk of poultry producers in Iran for the 1989-2006. CCV index was used to investigate amount of variation that cause each support policies (market price support, support of agricultural inputs, outputs insurance) on income risk variation of producers. The results of this study showed that percentage of index risk variation is decreased because of market price support, insurance, energy subsidy and total support policies. In addition, results showed just the effect of price supports and insurance subsidy on income risk is significant.

The main purpose of this research was the analysis of economic effects of fish farming pools establishment in Ardal county of Chaharemahal and Bakhtiyari province. This research was a sort of survey search measure and a questionnaire was compiled for collecting of data. Statistical society of this study was included of 171 fish farming units that 75 units were chosen by random sampling method. The results showed that all of producers are men and about 30 percents of them are illiterate. Also according to results of study, development of export and increasing of Farmers income is the most important economic effect of fish Farming establishment. Finally the results of factor analysis revealed that the economic effects were classified into 7 factors that these factors respectively to their importance were included of: improvement of investment in agricultural and nonagricultural section, improvement of employment situation, improvement of export, improvement of income, improvement of substructure and tourism attraction, improvement of demand and innovation expansion. In total, improvement of investment in the agricultural and non-agricultural section was recognized as the most important economic effect of the fish farming pools establishment.

In this study the AIDADS which is a generalization of Linear Expenditure System (LES) and in contrast to the latter model allows the presence of nonlinear relationship between demand and consumption expenditure is applied to the Iranian consumption data on beef, lamb, broiler, fish, milk, apple and orange for period 1976-2006. Results indicate that, income elasticity, derived from both restricted and unrestricted models, has a nonlinear relationship with per capita income (expenditure). Thus, LES which is widely used in empirical studies may results in an unrealistic elasticities and inappropriate policy implication. Results based on the estimated AIDADS reveal that income elasticity for beef and lamb are less than one, for apple is equal one, and for milk, fish and chicken is more than one. Therefore, the latter group of commodities is considered to luxury, while that of the first group is necessary.