Ezatollah Karami, Daryoosh Hayati,
Volume 2, Issue 1 (4-1998)
Abstract
Sustainability has become a part of the language of almost all development projects. Although, in many instances it has been overused and misused, attaining sustainability in agricultural development is always one of our concerns. This paper aims (1) to clarify and describe the core beliefs and values underlying the two opposing world views of agriculture, i.e., “conventional agricultural paradigm” and “sustainable agricultural paradigm” (2) to describe an instrument developed to measure the basic beliefs and values assumed to constitute the two competing paradigms (3) to measure the adherence of extensionists and researchers of the Ministry of Agriculture towards sustainable agriculture and (4) to compare the adherence to alternative paradigms against conventional agricultural paradigms of Iranian groups with permaculture groups and agricultural chemical dealers of USA. The instrument was used in a nation wide survey. A two-stage random sample was used. In the first stage, 11 provinces were randomly selected and then in each of the selected provinces a simple random sample of extension agents, extension experts and agricultural researchers were selected for the study. The findings indicated that there is no significant difference among agricultural researchers, extension agents and extension experts in their mean endorsement score of sustainable agriculture. Data from a similar study in the USA were used to provide a means of comparison. Two extreme groups were selected, permaculture group with strong sustainable agricultural score and agricultural chemical dealers with lowest mean scores of sustainable agriculture. The mean scores of sustainable agriculture adherence of three Iranian groups were considerably lower than that of the USA permaculture group. However, there was no significant difference between three Iranian groups and USA agricultural chemical dealers which indicates low adherence of Iranian sample to sustainable agriculture. Considering the challenges Iranian farmers face for food production in the next decade and the role of the Ministry of Agriculture personnel, recommendations are put forth for changing knowledge, attitudes and skills of agricultural researchers and extensionists.
