Search

Water conflict is considered as one of the major challenges in agricultural water management. "Agricultural water conflict" is a term describing disputes and differences among water stakeholders over an access to water resources in the agricultural sector. The purpose of this paper was to investigate farmers’ viewpoints toward agricultural water conflicts. A descriptive correlation method was adopted and the study was conducted in Doroodzan dam irrigation network in Fars province, Iran. Multistage stratified random sampling was used to collect data from 294 farmers. The research tool included a questionnaire whose validity was confirmed by a group of professionals. A pilot study was conducted during which the Cronbach's alpha test was calculated to determinate the reliability of data collection instrument. Findings revealed that, among the groups involved in water conflicts, the main conflict was between farmers and the government. Farmers in downstream were the main losers in water distribution. The dominant water conflict was "latent" as well. The main reasons for agricultural water conflict were "water scarcity", "drought", and "the kind of water management". Farmers' satisfaction toward water management was "low". Farmers’ age, education levels, satisfaction toward water management, and attitude toward geographical and climatic conditions had a significant relationship with agricultural water conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the distributive impacts of subsidy removal in agricultural sectors and related industry in Iran, using a social accounting matrix (SAM)-based price model. The structural path analysis approach is used to decompose the overall influences into direct, global, and total effects. The simulation results reveal that a shock therapy strategy, which involves the removal of all subsidies from all food producing sectors at once, amplifies the adverse effects of this policy option, especially on the low income households. Also, results indicate that removing subsidy from food producing sectors has distributional consequences for the Iranian households. The rural low income group is the most adversely affected group while the urban high income group is the least affected among the Iranian households. In addition, reducing subsidy in food industry sector has the largest impact on the households' welfare. Based on the results of the path decomposition of the households' expenditure, it is expected that less than 50 percent of the overall effects of subsidy removal appear almost immediately after implementing this policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims at analyzing farmers' responses on quality of agricultural information services provided by public and private sources. The study is based on primary survey of 461 farmers in eight districts of Uttar Pradesh, India, using a structured questionnaire. Farmers' responses on quality of agricultural information services from public and private sources were analyzed using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) technique. Findings of the study indicate that private sector information delivery sources provide significantly better quality information to the farming communities as compared to public sector information delivery systems. The results have far reaching implications for designing successful information and extension delivery models by the public, private or by collaborative efforts of the public and the private sector for better extension services delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the light of the 2008 World Development Report, this paper revisits the impact of agriculture on overall economic growth, in the case of an oil producing country, using indices of intersectoral linkages. To this end, four input-output tables of Iran's economy are utilized. The results support the importance of the agricultural sector in stimulating the economic growth of Iran, but also show that the manufacturing sector has a higher potential to increase domestic production through its intersectoral linkage effects. Consequently, the results provide a caveat to the recommended general policy of the World Bank that the agricultural sector can be considered a key sector for the economic development in developing countries, at least in an oil producing country like Iran. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]