An Identification of Appropriate Communication Models for Sustainable Production of Wheat in  Marvdasht County of Fars

Shahvali, Mansoor; Keshavarz, Marzie; Sharifzadeh, Mariam; Foroozani, Masoume; Yazdan Panah, Masoud

An Identification of Appropriate Communication Models for Sustainable Production of Wheat in Marvdasht County of Fars

Authors

Abstract

Overuse of chemical inputs and inappropriate use of water resources have caused unsustainability in most agricultural regions of Marvdasht County in Fars province. For an attainment of sustainable production of wheat, it is necessary to design appropriate communicational models for agricultural inputs and for water optimum usage, however, reviewing agricultural development literature revealed that most of extension efforts focus their attention on information delivery and on hard system technical aspects rather than fitting communicational relations of rich contents, suitable for stakeholders. This is while sustainable production of wheat necessarily requires using appropriate simultaneous information- communicational needs of stakeholders. This study attempts to measure chemical input and water usage in agricultural regions of three villages in Marvdasht, namely: Kheirabad, Ezabad, and Tajabad, by mean of a survey approach. Cochran's formula was employed to choose the study sample of 90 wheat growers. Data was gathered through observation, in-depth interviewing and through open and close ended questionnaire. A panel of experts verified face validity and a pilot study used to assess the reliability of the measuring instrument. Kruskal Wallis test, cluster analysis and correlational analysis were employed for data analysis. Findings revealed that, clear differences of three groups of farmers resulted in different information- communicational models of optimum chemical inputs and of water usage. This article presents these three models to sustainable production of wheat among the three groups of farmers.

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