Title: Factors affecting rice wastage in Mazandaran Province, Iran

Authors: Ebrahim Ebrahimi; Asghar Bagheri; Mojtaba Sookhtanlou; Fathollah Keshavarz Shal

Addresses: Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Iran ' Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Iran ' Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Iran ' Guilan Agricultural and Natural Resources Research and Education Center, Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization, Rasht, Iran

Abstract: This study investigated factors influencing rice wastage in Mazandaran Province, Iran. The wastage was estimated by a combination of the Delphi technique and interviews. Nineteen experts were sampled by snowball sampling for the Delphi technique. In addition, a sample of 258 farmers was sampled using Cochran's formula. Ordinal logistic regression using STATA Software was employed for data analysis. According to the results, 12 local factors influencing rice wastage were derived among which 'pests (Chilo suppressalis, Ephydra afghanica Dahl, etc.)', accounting for 5% of the wastage, was found to be the most important cause of wastage in the region. The findings also showed six factors - including age, educational level, farm area, mean crop yield, number of machines owned, and waste management knowledge - had significant and positive impact on increasing the wastage and discriminated the paddy growers in four groups, i.e., farmers with low, relatively low, relatively high and high wastage.

Keywords: rice wastage; rice growers; Delphi technique; Mazandaran; Iran.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEWM.2023.130719

International Journal of Environment and Waste Management, 2023 Vol.31 No.3, pp.308 - 324

Accepted: 12 Jul 2020
Published online: 04 May 2023 *

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