Farmers’ satisfaction regarding agricultural consulting, technical and engineering services corporations in Markazi Province

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Assistant Professors, Agricultural Extension and Education, Faculty of Agriculture, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran

2 Student and Senior Expert, Agricultural Extension and Education, Faculty of Agriculture, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran

3 MSc. Student and Senior Expert, Agricultural Extension and Education, Faculty of Agriculture, Tarbiat Modares University, Iran

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the farmers’ satisfaction regarding the performance of agricultural consulting, technical and engineering service corporations in Markazi Province. The research method was descriptive- correlation. The statistical population of the study consisted of all farmers who have benefited from the different services of the agricultural consulting, technical and engineering service ventures in Markazi Province (N= 9450). Using Kerjcie and Morgan’s (1970) table and proportional stratified random sampling technique 368 farmers selected as research sample. A questionnaire used to collect the data. The content validity of the questionnaire confirmed based on opinions of some of agricultural extension and education academic staffs and experts of Jihad-e- Keshavarzi organization in Tehran and Markazi Provinces. The data was analyzed using SPSSwin16 software. Based on the research results the farmers had less than moderate satisfaction from the agricultural consulting, technical and engineering service ventures. The farmers had tendency toward expert’s advisories, but were in doubt about using and advising this advisories to the other farmers. Based on the correlation results, there was positive and significant relationship between expert’s communication skills, increasing of farmer’s knowledge, and farmer’s trust to experts and increasing of farmer’s income with farmer’s satisfaction. The results of regression analysis showed that 31% of variances of farmer’s satisfaction explained by the two variables including expert’s communication skills and role of advisories in increasing of farmer’s knowledge.

Keywords


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