Drought management in rural areas with emphasis on resilience approach, studied in Kangavar city
Date of Publication
2021 12:00 AM
Security Theme
Extreme Events
Keywords
Extreme Events, Community Capital Disaster Management Cycle Resilience Kangavar County Structural Equations
Description
Drought is one of the natural phenomena and is considered as an important part of climatic conditions. Several studies have shown that Iran is one of the countries vulnerable to natural disasters in terms of geographical and climatic conditions. Thirty-one point seven percent of its total area is at risk of natural disasters and 70 percent of its population is in areas at risk of natural disasters and hazards, including drought with an average annual rainfall of 250 mm. The city of Kangavar is no exception and according to the SPI index at different time scales has an average of 44% of the days of the year experiencing drought. Therefore, what's important is how to deal with it. That’s to say, given the fact that it has enormous effects, some measures have been taken so far. This means that drought management practices are an important step in reducing the extent of damage and controlling its effects. The dominant approach to managing it in most parts of the world is still passive, meaning it responds after the drought has appeared. This approach is commonly known as crisis management. In this approach, providing government assistance to the disadvantaged without empowering them leads to reduced self-reliance and increased dependence on the government. Extensive literature review of drought in Iran shows that most studies in the field of drought have focused on assessment, monitoring and forecasting as well as economic, social and environmental impacts and less attention has been paid to drought risk management and disaster management. Considering the consequences and effects of the drought on the physical dimension and limited attention to its social dimensions, it has been mistakenly turned to physical and technological solutions rather than managerial, social and human activities in order to challenge this phenomenon. One approach which has recently been introduced in management literature is the concept of resilience, a concept that has attracted much attention by researchers and policymakers over the last decade, so it seems that the resilience approach has the potential to be combined with the disaster management approach. In disaster management (drought management), the combination of previous approaches with the resilience approach can provide the capacity for optimal management of the disasters. Based on this approach the notion of local rural areas pursuing social-economic development autonomously of outside influences (whether globalisation, external trade or governmental action) may be an ideal but it is not a practical proposition in contemporary Europe. Within this context, resilience thinking offers two key contributions for rural studies (and specifically the rural development literature). Firstly, resilience offers alternative analytical methods and insights for rural studies. For example, drawing on the emerging regional resilience literature, applying an evolutionary analytical perspective sheds new light on exploring the role of path dependencies in place development, and also indentifying ‘locked-in’ development trajectories based on entrenched interests and institutional apathy. Similarly, the evolutionary approach draws our attention not only to sudden shocks and disturbances within localities but also to ‘slow-burn. A second lesson for rural development from applying a resilience framework is to more fully embed environmental and ecological considerations into rural policy, practices and behaviour. This has two dimensions. The first relates to encouraging a shift towards environmentally sensitive rural lifestyles and consumption patterns This approach emphasizes the capacities, participation, empowerment and learning of the rural community to deal with disasters. The present study has been conducted in terms of applied purpose and quantitatively and seeks to investigate the relationship between community capitasl and resilience through the mediation of disaster management variables in the face of drought. The required data in this research have been collected using library and field methods. The statistical population of this study are the villagers of Khazal, Ghazineh, Kermajan, Fash and Goodin. Survey data were also collected using a questionnaire from 494 villagers as well as about 30 in-depth interviews. The first objective of the study was to assess the drought situation and its consequences in the region. The results obtained from SPI index at different time scales showed that on average 44% of the days of the year experienced drought, with consequences such as low environmental impact. Depths of underground waters, soil erosion, soil salinization, pest and disease and social consequences include mistrust of officials, settlers entering the village, migration and aging of the village face, rising marriage age, as well as economic consequences including livestock sales. Unemployment has driven up agricultural and livestock spending, and so on. Another objective of this study was to study the mechanism of drought management in the region using the Lisrel Structural Studies method. The results showed that most of the indices were reported as desirable and the model fitted well with the data indicating that the items were in agreement with the theoretical construct. Therefore, each component of standard factor loadings, t-statistic and coefficients of determination in different tables and then their respective factor analysis diagrams were presented separately. Finally, due to the nature of the data used for regression and path analysis and give the hidden relationships between independent and dependent variables, it was not possible to use focal analysis method. In order to evaluate the status of community capital before and after the measures performed, paired t-test was used, which showed a significant difference. The results showed that human, financial and political capital had the least impact on drought preparedness and cultural capital. In terms of reduction, financial
Drought management in rural areas with emphasis on resilience approach, studied in Kangavar city
Drought is one of the natural phenomena and is considered as an important part of climatic conditions. Several studies have shown that Iran is one of the countries vulnerable to natural disasters in terms of geographical and climatic conditions. Thirty-one point seven percent of its total area is at risk of natural disasters and 70 percent of its population is in areas at risk of natural disasters and hazards, including drought with an average annual rainfall of 250 mm. The city of Kangavar is no exception and according to the SPI index at different time scales has an average of 44% of the days of the year experiencing drought. Therefore, what's important is how to deal with it. That’s to say, given the fact that it has enormous effects, some measures have been taken so far. This means that drought management practices are an important step in reducing the extent of damage and controlling its effects. The dominant approach to managing it in most parts of the world is still passive, meaning it responds after the drought has appeared. This approach is commonly known as crisis management. In this approach, providing government assistance to the disadvantaged without empowering them leads to reduced self-reliance and increased dependence on the government. Extensive literature review of drought in Iran shows that most studies in the field of drought have focused on assessment, monitoring and forecasting as well as economic, social and environmental impacts and less attention has been paid to drought risk management and disaster management. Considering the consequences and effects of the drought on the physical dimension and limited attention to its social dimensions, it has been mistakenly turned to physical and technological solutions rather than managerial, social and human activities in order to challenge this phenomenon. One approach which has recently been introduced in management literature is the concept of resilience, a concept that has attracted much attention by researchers and policymakers over the last decade, so it seems that the resilience approach has the potential to be combined with the disaster management approach. In disaster management (drought management), the combination of previous approaches with the resilience approach can provide the capacity for optimal management of the disasters. Based on this approach the notion of local rural areas pursuing social-economic development autonomously of outside influences (whether globalisation, external trade or governmental action) may be an ideal but it is not a practical proposition in contemporary Europe. Within this context, resilience thinking offers two key contributions for rural studies (and specifically the rural development literature). Firstly, resilience offers alternative analytical methods and insights for rural studies. For example, drawing on the emerging regional resilience literature, applying an evolutionary analytical perspective sheds new light on exploring the role of path dependencies in place development, and also indentifying ‘locked-in’ development trajectories based on entrenched interests and institutional apathy. Similarly, the evolutionary approach draws our attention not only to sudden shocks and disturbances within localities but also to ‘slow-burn. A second lesson for rural development from applying a resilience framework is to more fully embed environmental and ecological considerations into rural policy, practices and behaviour. This has two dimensions. The first relates to encouraging a shift towards environmentally sensitive rural lifestyles and consumption patterns This approach emphasizes the capacities, participation, empowerment and learning of the rural community to deal with disasters. The present study has been conducted in terms of applied purpose and quantitatively and seeks to investigate the relationship between community capitasl and resilience through the mediation of disaster management variables in the face of drought. The required data in this research have been collected using library and field methods. The statistical population of this study are the villagers of Khazal, Ghazineh, Kermajan, Fash and Goodin. Survey data were also collected using a questionnaire from 494 villagers as well as about 30 in-depth interviews. The first objective of the study was to assess the drought situation and its consequences in the region. The results obtained from SPI index at different time scales showed that on average 44% of the days of the year experienced drought, with consequences such as low environmental impact. Depths of underground waters, soil erosion, soil salinization, pest and disease and social consequences include mistrust of officials, settlers entering the village, migration and aging of the village face, rising marriage age, as well as economic consequences including livestock sales. Unemployment has driven up agricultural and livestock spending, and so on. Another objective of this study was to study the mechanism of drought management in the region using the Lisrel Structural Studies method. The results showed that most of the indices were reported as desirable and the model fitted well with the data indicating that the items were in agreement with the theoretical construct. Therefore, each component of standard factor loadings, t-statistic and coefficients of determination in different tables and then their respective factor analysis diagrams were presented separately. Finally, due to the nature of the data used for regression and path analysis and give the hidden relationships between independent and dependent variables, it was not possible to use focal analysis method. In order to evaluate the status of community capital before and after the measures performed, paired t-test was used, which showed a significant difference. The results showed that human, financial and political capital had the least impact on drought preparedness and cultural capital. In terms of reduction, financial
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