pistachio

Purpose: In this research, we aimed to identify the pattern of cooperative relations among the Pistachio producers in Damankuh rural district in Damghan. The social capital among the producers was also evaluated. Design/methodology/approach: In this paper, the cooperative relations and the social capital among the Pistachio producers in Mehmandoost, Zarrinabad and Hoseinabad Doolab, which are located in Damankooh in Damghan, were studied by applying social network analysis method. Thus, 66 people from Mehmandoost, 70 producers from Zarrinabad, and 74 farmers from Hosseinabad Dulab were studied. The relations which were studied included cooperation in exchanging farming tools, irrigation of Pistachio orchards, marketing and pest control. For analyzing these relations, we used network- level indicators of social network analysis including density, centralization, reciprocity, transitivity and Geodesic distance. These indicators were analyzed in the UCINET software. Finding: Results showed that the network macro-level indicators including density, centralization, reciprocity, transitivity and geodesic distance in studied villages were very low. This has caused problems for producers to cooperate with each other and threatens the stability of producers’ network and indicates cooperation among pistachio producers requires tremendous investment of both time and cost. Research limitations/implications: Problems like accessing farmers, distributing questionnaires among them and the long time needed in order to interview them were among the challenges faced in this research. Practical implications¬: In order to increase cooperation among the producers and social capital in their network it is suggested that farmers be instructed and informed by holding cooperative workshops, handling their problems in irrigation and pest control, running local cooperatives for supporting the farmers in the crop prices and paying attention to their demands. Originality/value: Given the importance of the studied area in the production of Pistachio, paying attention to cooperation and social capital among producers, can be a big step in using the fertility (potentiality) of this region to develop and improve the Pistachio production.

Brands are considered one of the most valuable intangible assets. Branding is the idea of creating a unique feature to differentiate and is one of the essential components in tourism programs and the important tools for urban tourism development in different aspects of economic, social, cultural, environmental and physical. In this study, it is tried to investigate the impact of the global brand on the development of the tourism economy of the Damghan city. LESREL software had been used for this purpose . The research method was descriptive - analytic and of application type. In this study, data collection was done through SPSS and questionnaire distribution and library studies. The results of analysis of an agent for investigation of features (awareness, loyalty, image, perceived quality) on particular value of the pistachio brand in Damghan city indicated that the collected data were well supported the pattern and the overall indicators showed proper adequacy of the pattern by the data .Also after reviewing the second - order factorial analysis, it was found that all the factorial loads were meaningful and support the indicators and variables well. The investigations outcome of the impact rate of pistachio global brand on the development of tourism economy using T- test, showed that the acquired average is more than mean 3, and acquired meaningful level 0.000at level of 0.95 Indicated the high impact of pistachio particular brand on tourism economic development in Damghan city. Studying the results of direct and indirect effects of the global brand of pistachio in urban tourism development in economical dimensions using Path analysis test, showed that due to the acquired Betas, it is indicator of direct impact of global brand of pistachio on development of tourism industry in Damghan city.