Journal of Regional Planning
Year:2015 | Volume:5 | Issue:19|Papers Count:15

Tourism is a complex system, which competition in it without considering the necessary arrangements and understanding its needs and requirements is impossible. Therefore, more efficient development of tourism and promoting positive outcomes require its integrated management. The aim of this descriptive and analytical study refers to investigate the role of tourism-integrated management as a strategy for regional development the West Azerbaijan province by using questionnaire and statistical analyses. Thus, the current research, in terms of the nature is descriptive-analytical, and in terms of aim is practical. Statistical population studied in this research was experts (approximately 130 persons) of Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization of the West Azerbaijan province, of which 100 persons were determined and chosen as the sample by using Morgan's table, cluster and random sampling method. Descriptive statistics methods were used for data analysis and Chi-Square test was used to test research hypotheses in inferential statistics. The results indicate that there is a significant relation between tourism integrated management and regional development in the West Azerbaijan province. Moreover, based on the "Chi-Square" test results, the two components of institutional strengthening and capacity building, and tourism stakeholders' participation have significant relationship with tourism integrated management. In addition, the test results of the proposed model for variables in Amos22software show that the model proposed for variables relations predicts 76% of variance related to research dependent variable. Therefore, for regional development in parallel with tourism, institutional strengthening, capacity building, the relationships and participation of all stakeholders are considered as important strategies.

Recent era, the age of the emergence and spread of cities and urbanization; is tending to reside in the cities in of most countries, especially the less developed countries. A major feature of urbanization problem in less developed countries, in addition to the new town on the way of urbanization and socio-cultural urban problems, refers to inappropriate spatial distribution of cities in the urban network. Macrocephaly urban phenomena in the system is appeared in less developed countries, in which the size of large cities in these countries is 5 to 10 times more than the size of population of the second city. The accumulation and centralization of administrative activities –political, business, and social-cultural activities -in big cities subsequently caused the imbalances and inappropriate spatial distribution of cities in the urban network. In accordance to land use plan Stiran was divided into ten main region in 1365. The purpose of this quantitative-analytic study refers to analyze the urban network in the metropolitan region of Khuzestan (including the provinces of Khuzestan and Kohgiluyeh Boyer Ahmad). For studying the role of macro-economic area during recent decade analytic models were used such as rank - size Zypf, Rank - size, adjusted coefficient, entropy, urban first index, Lorenz curve and jinni coefficient to analyze urban network. The results of this study show that the urban macro-region of Khuzestan region does not comply with the law ranking. Khuzestan. Relatively good spatial balance between population and large number of cities in the region is established. There is semi-balanced situation between distribution of population of cities and urban group. Finally, macro-regional level severely led to the formation of Macrocephaly phenomena in macro-level of Ahwaz region. For preventing the formation of the first urban area in the macro-level decentralization should stop migration of small and middle cities within the province into provincial towns and strength the middle.

Globalization growth and rapid changes in global environment made the issue of regional competitiveness increasingly important in accelerating the development of local communities. One of the consequences of globalization is the emergence of strong local economies which their GDP, in some cases, are more than the GDP of many countries. From the 1990s, the concept of regional competitiveness in the public assemblies of developed countries and some developing countries has become a major issue through which the countries can make a clear set of policies to stimulate the development of their own regions. Under this circumstances, the purpose of this study refers to identify and prioritize the most important factors that contribute to the development of the Kurdistan province. This descriptive-analytical study, regarding to the typology of regional competitiveness studies is an exploratory research, is based on qualitative and quantitative data. Quantitative data have been gathered through documentary studies and qualitative data through questionnaire-distribution. At first, based on the theoretical and empirical literature studies, the regional competitiveness evaluation factors of study has composed of 4 main factors, 26 criteria and 62 sub-criteria then by identifying and prioritizing the factors influenced regional competitiveness in the Kurdistan province by means of the MSA analytical model and Excel software used to analyze the gathered data via questionnaire-distribution among 29 experts engaged in 8 main economic drivers of the region. The results indicate that in the first level, the "economic factor" with 0.24, "institutional-political factor," with 0.18 and in the second level, sub-criteria such as "efficiency of production system" with 0.44 and "public policy" with 0.43 have the greatest impact on improving the competitiveness of the Kurdistan region. Therefore, with regard to the economic drivers of the region, "forestry", "agriculture" and "building" with 1.32, 1.17 and 1.04 are the most competitive activity sectors of region, respectively.

Nowadays, comprehensive agricultural development and principles can be achieved based on accurate scientific method and understand the potency of each area and environmental capabilities. One of these methods is the use of Geographical Information System that derived the potency and zoning of variety of agricultural products through different models and algorithms. The aim of this research refers to the comprehensive evaluation of potency cultivation of agricultural crops with planning approach and understanding of the natural ingredient and elements in cultivation of saffron in Qaenat and Zirko county by using Geographical Information System capability through AHP model. In this study, after collecting information and theoretical foundations and preparing different layers, a process of hierarchical analysis was used to determine interest-prone areas. In this case, the different stages including: the weight of the layers and their overlapping, and ultimately obtaining final map that indicates the various zones for saffron Cultivation. Layers of this study are as follows; parameter average maximum annual of temperature, average minimum annual of temperature, PH soil, elevation, annual precipitation, slope, land use. The results showed that more than 2,746 sq.km (17.60%) of the region for cultivation of saffron is very suitable without limitation but severely restricted zone with area of 2126 km² (13.62%) is existed. Also, yielding zones were compared with current land without restrictions. Moreover, some parts of the area under that is now under saffron cultivation is not possible to exploit.

Continuity and sustainability of the political, social and cultural life of every society depends on social cohesion and the unity of the members of that community. Iran is a country with different tribes. The distinct characteristics of each ethnic groups in Iran is based on the components of linguistic and religious groups Iranian ethnic living in border areas with neighboring countries, and also their own language provides background for the occurrence of ethnic crisis and national security. The aim of this study was to investigate the social cohesion in maintaining border security with emphasis on ethnic religious diversity. This descriptive analytical research used questionnaire for gathering information, and also SPSS software to determine the data and one-sample T-test was used to test the hypothesis. The sample was 2610 family resident in Zabol, and 380 people were chosen according to kokaran formula. The results indicate that respect index to parents and elders, sympathize at the time of the incident, cooperation in working time with significant level of 0 have acquired the highest rank. Among social security indexes, satisfaction index from security officials (6.669) and confidence to border resident (5.104) placed in the highest ranking that derive from government's efforts to establish security in the region. The employed population working in agriculture (399.7) and the percentage of the population employed to work in the service sector (282.4) are the highest-ranking in economic security. This implies that if the border residents of Sistan have adequate water resources and government officials support, the agriculture sector will be improved. Indexes of equal access to jobs and economic opportunity (6.640) and equal access to economic information (8.928) have lowest rank, which requests more favorable investment policies in this area.

Reviews of various research shows that immigration specifically from rural areas to urban areas, and sustainable rural development have been widely studied, while hosting immigration in rural areas and its relationship with social stability and sustainability topics in particular has been of less interest to researchers. The aim of the present research is to study the role of hosting immigration rural areas that surround metropolitans in social stability and instability of villages. The research method is descriptive-analytical with an emphasis on field research, and filling researcher-made questionnaires. The participants included 92 rural residents who had experienced immigration in Tehran metropolitan area during the last few decades, and the statistical sample included 18 rural areas that were selected according to different criteria such as the growth rate of over three percent, rural areas with more than 50 families, natural situation (mountain and desert), and their distance to Tehran metropolitan area. The collected data was analyzed by SPSS statistical software. The results of the study revealed and depicted relatively low levels of education, youth population, high rate of employment in unofficial sectors, and high percentage of tenantry among the immigrated residents, social instability in rural areas around Tehran metropolitan area. After calculating statistics and considering Per Scott Allen classification as the basis, stability in host rural areas around Tehran metropolitan area were evaluated in terms of social stability. The stability levels of the rural areas under study were as follows; 22 percent had good sustainability, 16 percent had moderate sustainability, 27 percent had weak sustainability, and 11 percent had unsustainability. Therefore; about 55 percent of the rural areas under study from social aspect at moderate level tend towards unsustainability. Also according to Per Scott Allen table, stability status of sustainable social development was acceptable or relatively stable in indicators of social safety, social solidarity, and the feeling of belonging to place. Social issues and social justice were in good or stable condition, the indicators of social participation and social trust were in bad or unstable condition.

In modern life, the different levels of social and economic activities of the individuals that led to the formation of the needs, desires and expectations of their demand for land use. This change in management decisions and policies, especially in policies and land management in the geographical space or spaces organized including rural areas provides the context of the strategic decision. This descriptive- analytical study is practical and its purpose refers to assess the appropriate use and management of land use from rural lands of villages in the central section of Mammasani county. In order to analysis the preliminary data findings of the research examined by SWOT model that 10 point of strength, 11 threats, 10 weakness, 10 opportunity and 18 strategy have been presented. Finally, strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities were ranked by the experts’ viewpoint based on TOPSIS techniques. On the base of TOPSIS technique shows that threats have the most influence in optimization and usage balanced rural development and opportunities are placed at the second rank. Hence, for a balanced development and land use optimization in this part defensive strategy should be considered as priority.

Today, locate the user in the appropriate direction of realization of a proper development is one of the necessary planning in the national and regional levels. In addition to the economic benefits, location the appropriate place for the establishment of industries is important in order to reduce and cut abnormal its effects on the environment. The aim of this descriptive-analytic study refers to determine the criteria affecting the location of industrial zone based on analytical method, collecting data, library studies and field observations. In this study, 10 indicators of natural, geographical, and environmental and land zoning by multi-criteria decision model (TOPSIS, Vikor, Electra and Saw) were attempting to determine appropriate locations for industrial zone. According to studies and apply the weight of AHP model and GIS software can be mentioned that earthquake, and topography of pollution are the most responsible factors in positioning the industrial town of Tabriz. Meanwhile East of Tabriz is appropriate for industrial zones. In addition, the maps obtained by applying weights north and south zones of Tabriz highland regions are close industrial town location is inappropriate. More specifically, the 224,045 hectares of land in Tabriz, 100,957 hectares (=45 percent) of fourth zone for the construction of Industrial town is completely appropriate and third zone 3 is totally inappropriate for the construction of Industrial town.

The Expanding urbanization and the emergence of new needs have shifted the focus of planning to the social aspects of urban life from the physical-spatial aspect. Social capital is one of the issues that its establishment, maintenance, and enrichment is considered as main the main goal of sustainable urban development. This research aims to study the relationship between the indicators of the evaluation measures of social capital, and the urban environmental quality in Babolsar. In total for the research, 6 components and 20 items were determined for measuring social capital, and 7 components and 26 items were used for the quality assessment of the environment. The sample population was increased to 310 individuals. In order to assess and evaluate the study variables a single-sample t-test, Pearson’s correlation factors, Regression analysis regression analysis and the SPSS software were used. The findings of the research show that from the society perspective, the social capital in the city of BABOLSAR in terms of social security, interoperability, norm integration, and accountability is favorable. Also, it shows a significant positive direct correlation at the level of 0.01 degree of certainty between the two variables of social capital and quality of environment, in a way that approximately 46% of the changes related to the quality of environment is defined by the social capital component. Any increase in the levels of social capital, particularly in the form of relationship between groups is correlated with the increases in the quality of environment area, economic, social, and political expansions, and other positive outcomes.

Urban spaces as a space for human interactions and evolution has been important from the beginning of the history of Islam. Urban squares are one of the public spaces in the city that have especial influence in the identity of urban space, the perception of the spatial environment of citizens, residents and an awarded memory to the citizens of a city. By using an applied-descriptive survey method, this study investigates the identity, physical, social and cognitive features of eight selected square in Shiraz, including Liberty, Teacher, Martyrs, Ghaem, Eram, Vali Asr, Setad and Namazi Squares. The sample was selected using the sampling criteria which include historical significance, location in the city, their extent, damage or health status. Based on Theoretical Principles of study, five component categories including identity, aesthetic physical, social, and historical quality with twenty sub-components have been evaluated. The study sample was 280 people by use of simple random sampling. The made questionnaire with the help of specialists was used as research tool. The mean and standard deviation at descriptive statistical levels and one-sample t-test at inferential statistics level were used to analyze the data. The results showed that regarding local identity aspect, Liberty square and Eram with 92.3 and 26.4 averages, respectively, were higher than optimal value and positive P value is assigned to them. Namazi Square was optimal with an average of 3.13 at the P level of less than 0.05, and the Martyrs, Atlasi, Setad, Vali Asr and Teacher square with an average of 2.56, 2.30, 2.56, 1.86 lower than the optimal value 1 with a negative P value. Among all the main components in this project, Eram square has high optimal value and a positive P value, its mean higher than the individual average, and Vali Asr Square with a score between 1 and 2 with a negative P value and its average lower than the individual average has the lowest optimal value.

The aim of this research was to study the role of rural ICT offices in social development of rural women. The data collected through questionnaire. The statistical population of this study consisted of 5018 literate, over 15- year -old rural, women living in 16 rural areas facilitated by ICT offices in Shahreza city in which 190 rural women selected as sample population by using Cochran formula and the stratified random sampling for selecting samples. Content validity of the questionnaire was achieved through experts' view and its validity estimated 0.74 by using KMO. Reliability of the research instrument confirmed through Cronbach's Coefficient Alpha estimated 0.79- 0.86. SPSS software was used to analyze the gathered data. The results of the research showed that the most awareness of rural women was in “basic services” and the highest rate of their referring to ICT offices was to receive basic services. The impact of ICT on the social development of rural women can be mentioned in some aspects such as: increasing awareness and participation of rural women, improving quality of provided services in rural area, social justice of rural women and the consent of their position; respectively. The results of correlation analysis showed that there is a significant positive relationship between social development of rural women and independent variables such as: education, number of traveling in year and financial independence at the 0.05 level, the awareness about ICT services and use ICT services at the 0.01 level. The regression analysis result indicates that three significant variables affecting the dependent variable of social development of rural women are: percentage of rural women's financial independence, awareness about services of ICT offices and the rate of their referring to ICT offices for receiving ICT services.

Rural entrepreneurship development is a potential to help the variation of income of rural people, increasing agricultural and non-agricultural rural productions, providing appropriate opportunities to reduce the livelihoods risk, increasing the sustainable food safety in rural areas. The outstanding the effect of rural entrepreneurship development refers to create opportunity for employment in agriculture and non-agriculture sectors. Therefore, the aim of the present study refers to analyze the factors affecting rural constant development with emphasis on the entrepreneurship. The spatial scope of the study is Northern Marhamat Abad Rural district-Miandoab County included 8 villages. Because of the less number of villages, all the villages were considered as a part of the target population. In 1390, the population of this rural district was 10289 and included 2800 households that 139 households of this population are selected as the sample by modified Cochran formula. The selection of these households in each village was conducted by Simple Randomization in accordance with the principle of equal opportunity. The reliability of the questionnaire by using of Cronbach's Alpha method obtained 0.616. For analyzing the obtained data, factor analysis was used by exploratory method. The results show that the most important factors that have led to entrepreneurship development and also rural development are economic and personal factors. By increasing the facilities such as self-employed loans, necessary and sufficient financial resources and employment diversity have somehow caused the increasing of motivation and individual morality in order to the development of the entrepreneurship in the study area. Also, substructure factor had the least effect among 8 factors on the development of the entrepreneurship.

One of factor that affect rural administrator’s effectiveness is their social base. In this study, the social base, age, sex and social stratification of rural administrator were considered. The data of this descriptive –Analytical study have been collected by an emphasis on field research, and filling researcher-made questionnaires, interviews and observation. The population of study is 1,537 households from 11 villages with over 50 households that 267 household as statistical samples are selected through the Cochrane formula. The results showed that that there is a significant difference between performance and age, this means that rural administrators in the age groups 40-30 had better performance than the other age groups. Also, there is a significant difference between the performance and literacy; rural administrators had better performance with a bachelor's degree, but there is a low significant difference between performance and social stratification in which the middle class group had better performance.

With a large speed of urbanization in many cities in Iran, especially large metropolises were faced with lack of stability. The Tabriz pollution crisis is studied as one of the eight infected city in Iran. This study is based on these questions: What is the best interpolation algorithm for distribution of air pollution? Which part of Tabriz has the most density of pollutants? Which applications are effective in reducing and increasing air pollution? To answer these questions, statistical data pollutants related to particulate air pollution (PM10), ozone (O3), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and carbon dioxide (CO2) had been collected for measuring air pollutants from five stations measuring air pollutants from 1383 to 1392 for each month of the year. Then the collected data were analyzed by different geostatistical interpolation mode such as ARC GIS software. The coefficient rate of interpolation error RMSE and MAE of Kriging was at lower place in comparison with IDW interpolation method. The PSI of air pollution and air quality standards are compared. The status of air quality in desired stations was determined and the role of user interaction or effective increase in reducing contamination of land were introduced.

The goal of urban planners and administrators is developing the logical ordering of human and natural user in a collection system. The most favorable interactions between subsystems can be caused the maximum of positive entropy and the development of modern city. In this study, the most important issue is whether the physical development of the city of Shiraz comply with the dynamic conditions or empty of turmoil? For this reason, in this study, the first phase of the above-mentioned issue is viewed as a system, and in the second stage, each of the components and subsystems (including sub bioclimatic, geomorphologic and anthropogenic) is defined to quantify. So that in this respect, the output of the thirty year’s meteorological organization climate were converted to analog data. The heart of the inductive Shiraz climate studies have been analyzed by interpolation. As well with the two-flat pixels and three-dimensional spatial information is harvested. The spatial arrangement of geometrical and numerical data can be used to algebraic analysis the structure of chaotic, fractal or fuzzy subsystems positioning. Knowing the area of natural and physical development of interactive performance can be used for the whole Shiraz urban system development with minimal negative entropy flow of matter and energy in all aspects and the highest negative feedback system. The result of this analysis not only led to the prediction of a non-equilibrium in the geomorphological dynamics system of Shiraz city and control subsystem but also It can be led from non-equilibrium to equilibrium in the natural and human system of Shiraz.