JOURNAL OF RURAL RESEARCH
Year:2019 | Volume:10 | Issue:1 |Papers Count:10

The rural community in Mazandaran is characterized by agricultural traits and rice cultivation. Indeed, agriculture plays an important role in the social, cultural, economic and environmental relations of rural communities in this province. Considering two types of agriculture, this study aims at the relationship between them and a sustainable system which farmers believe can be achieved in farming. The research method was both quantitative and qualitative. In the quantitative part, a questionnaire was used to collect the data. The farmers that were selected were those who had experience with modern agriculture under the influence of agricultural development programs. In the qualitative part, interviews were conducted with a sample of 20 farmers until data saturation. In this research, a sample of three villages around the city of Amol was selected where the farmers had experience with both traditional and modern agricultural systems. The findings show that, in terms of sustainability, there is a fundamental difference between traditional and modern agricultural practices. Based on the results of the analysis, traditional agriculture has a direct impact on sustainability, and farmers are aware of this. However, where the economy is prevailed by profit attitudes and the other sectors are not involved in agriculture, circumstances are not in line with sustainability.

In the contemporary world, sites of cultural heritage play an important role in local development, but, in Iran, local culture does not seem to be very based on cultural heritage. Despite the tangible cultural richness of historical buildings and their distribution in the less developed and rural areas of the country, cultural legacy has not been considered as a desirable element of development yet. This study discusses the "historical home" of the people in the village of Kozj with an interpretive approach. It considers the interpretation of village houses desirable enough for the local development and the identification of local values. Historic houses are, in fact, the available precious heritage that can shed light on the past societies. The study deals with the experiences of the residents in the village through the hermeneutical interpretation of the historical architecture of the village. In this regard, the cultural landscape of the village is extracted and interpreted phenomenologically through small collections of data. Also, through the hermeneutic cycle, three stages of human life are identified and interpreted.

Sarand is a village in the county of Harris in the East Azerbaijan province, Iran. In 2012, it suffered a total destruction in an earthquake. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the housing pattern proposed for the injured and to compare it with the previous patterns. Also, a comparative evaluation is performed of the behavioral patterns in both pre-and post-earthquake settings to clarify the deficiencies and problems encountered. In order to achieve the desired goals, in addition to studying the existing documents, a field survey was done. For this purpose, the descriptive exploratory method was used in the research. The results of the research indicate that the patterns of place-behavior in Sarand village houses after the earthquake are fundamentally different from the pre-earthquake patterns. Due to the hasty reconstruction of buildings, little or no attention was paid to the traditional and indigenous patterns, participation of the villagers, and issues of rural livelihoods. In addition, the results indicate that the language of the new housing model after the earthquake is in contrast to the language of the traditional housing model. In the case of human patterns, it can be concluded that the place-behavior patterns of traditional houses have turned into poor physical-functional patterns in the new houses. Therefore, possible problems in such cases can be reduced in the future by the cooperation and involvement of users in reconstruction processes, using of their experiences and opinions, and application of traditional and indigenous principles.

Research in scientific fields is mainly a qualitative issue which requires a level of qualitative analysis and involves the discovery of the relationships among research variables. One of the most important issues in the discussion of human topics is demography and, in particular, the recognition of demographic features. In this regard, this study seeks to examine the state of aging in Iranian rural communities in 390 counties of the country by using fuzzy logic. The research is a descriptive-analytic type and applied in terms of purpose. It was carried out through secondary analyses. The required data were derived from the Statistics Center of Iran and covered six indicators including the ratio of aging and youth, the ratio of genders, the ratio of old age, potential support and parental support. The results showed that, according to the designed database, the rural areas in the margins of Iran have a low rate of aging due to desirable conditions in the six indicators. In contrast, the rural areas in the internal parts of Iran are severely aged and are moving toward aging rapidly. The results of this study were also compared with the ethnicity map of Iran. It was indicated that the findings of this study about the aging process strongly overlap the information on the ethnicity map. Due to the broad ethnic distribution in the geographical boundaries of Iran, the, the desire to have children is higher than that in the central parts of the country. This has led to an increase in the desirable values of the six indicators in the marginal areas and the superiority of those areas over the internal parts.

The purpose of this study was to delineate methods of sustainable agricultural water management. The study is based on a mixed methodology, namely both quantitative and qualitative. The statistical population included 130 water experts in Hamedan province. In the qualitative phase, 35 participants were purposefully selected, but, in the quantitative phase, there were 100 experts selected randomly according to Krejcie and Morgan’ s sampling table. In order to identify the relationships between the independent variables (i. e. solutions to water management) and the dependent variable (i. e. sustainable agricultural water management), structural equation modeling was used through the PLS algorithm. The results showed that 55 % of the dependent variable variance was determined by 13 independent variables. Of these variables, the irrigation planning solution proved to be the main solution with the highest impact and a coefficient of 0. 275. The next five factors with great effects on sustainable agricultural water management included applied and continuous training, water recycling, water transfer efficiency, information sharing, and reducing agricultural wastes with impact coefficients of 0. 269, 0. 247, 0. 209, 0. 197, and 0. 172 respectively.

Food security and water security are the fundamental components of community policy making. Through increasing safety and health as well as taking care of future generations and marginal groups, food security serves as one of the key issues related to sustainable rural and agriculture development. However, for the future of the world food, supplying the necessary water is a serious global challenge. With regard to the importance of the social acceptance of cost-benefit issues about water supplying for wheat self-sufficiency in the country, this paper seeks to respond to the question ‘ how socially acceptable are the water supply programs for wheat self-sufficiency? ’ . Agriculture census (2012-13) and NETWAT data were used to compare the water consumption for wheat and other crops. A virtual workshop design was implemented for a social discourse about the reasons of water supply for wheat self-sufficiency. This was according to the integral future studies approach (2014-15). The data collection tool was a questionnaire (α = 0. 05, chronbakh = 0. 73) taken by a sample of 47 experts. As the results of the t-test (α = 0. 05) showed, the experts would accept the pursuit of water supply programs for wheat self-sufficiency provided that water productivity is promoted and the following conditions are fulfilled: a) maintenance of the unique position of wheat in the food basket of the society, b) less water requirement for wheat than for most crops, c) insured access to wheat through its domestic production, d) improvement of national economic capacity, e) maintenance of agricultural employment capacity especially in rural areas, and f) maintenance and enhancement of national security.

Rural development programs based on different patterns in Lorestan province did not have the expected effect on the economic prosperity and improvement of villagers' life. Socially, they had no success to establish the participation of villagers and their empowerment either. In order to eliminate these shortcomings from the rural areas of the province, it is necessary to identify and analyze the key factors in presenting a rural spatial planning pattern through a foresight approach. In this research, Delphi and panel techniques together with the analysis of interactions were implemented with the MicMac software to identify and analyze the key factors involved in designing a pattern for rural spatial planning. The results showed that, out of 40 main problems in rural programs, 13 factors are the most important ones to affect the design of a pattern for the rural areas of Lorestan. These factors include rural perspective, futurism, environment, rural economic structure, rural governance, alternative scenarios, features of the regions, land use planning, rural participation, spatial development principles, rural, local capacity and social capital, rural management, and convergence-divergence of the sectors.

In this research, a socio-economic analysis of drought was conducted from the perspective of farmers in Isfahan Province. The research was based on an interpretive-constructive approach, and its method was qualitative. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews. The sample size was 35 farmers in the central and western parts of Isfahan Province who were selected based on the purposeful sampling of the maximum diversity. The basis for the completion of the interviews was theoretical saturation. To analyze the data obtained from the interviews, a systematic field theory analysis was done. The results of the study indicated that, from the farmers' point of view, drought is a multifactor phenomenon induced by multiple causes. In general, the farmers enumerated four main factors as the causes of drought, including ineffective water management, self-centered agriculture, climate change, and fatalistic causes.

Nowadays, entrepreneurship and the creation of entrepreneurial activities are the best strategy for the survival and development of villages. The present research aims at zoning the rural areas of Pars Abad in terms of the relative advantages of entrepreneurship and the factors that affect it. The research is based on a descriptive-analytic method. Data gathering was done by document and field methods, i. e. questionnaire and observation. The statistical population of the study consisted of entrepreneurs and villagers. According to the sample, 22 rural entrepreneurs were selected by the random sampling method, and 377 villagers were selected randomly. To evaluate the relative advantage of rural entrepreneurship, the scale advantage index (SAI), efficiency advantage index (EAI), spatial advantage index (LQ) and collective advantage index (AAI) were used through a hierarchical cluster analysis. Also, to investigate the affecting factors, Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance was done. The change-share method was used to predict the growth status of entrepreneurship in rural areas. As the results showed, Aslandois, Islamabad, Savalan and Oltan have the greatest comparative advantage in rural entrepreneurship. It was also found that differentiating factors are mainly local practices that affect the quantity and quality of entrepreneurship.

This research aims at the pathology of the consequences of development plans in the rural areas of Varzaqan city. The research was conducted through a mixed method. In terms of purpose, it is functional, and, in nature, it is a descriptive-analytical study. In terms of data collection, it is a mixed type, and it is philosophically based on a pragmatist approach. The statistical population consisted of 132 local experts who participated in a quantitative section by responding to a researcher-made questionnaire and 51 experts who took part in two stages of qualitative semistructured interviews and observations. Lack of suitable employment opportunities for young people, lack of productive activities, unsuccessful establishment of industries connected with the existing mines in the region, unsuccessful industries and small workshops of agricultural employment, and increasing poverty and social deprivation were the most important findings of the qualitative analysis by the Grounded theory. The results of the goodness-fit assessment obtained from the PLS structural model showed that the proposed model was compatible with the experimental data at an optimal level. Also, in the study area, there was a unified relationship among social, economic, physical and comprehensive consequences. The economic and social consequences of developmental plans were found to have led to certain spatial and comprehensive situations. The analysis of the spatial outcomes with comprehensive implications showed the weakening of rural and agricultural status in national development attempts and the mismatch of measures with the foundations of sustainable development. These two parameters were among the most important variables with high impact coefficients.