rural settlements

Purpose- The main objective of present study is analysis of viewpoints of Boyer-Ahmad local communities about rural development. The criteria of rural development are identified by a systematic approach from the standpoints of people who are aware of current rural issues in the investigated villages. In the next stage, the level of development of settlements was determined according to the identified criteria. Design/methodology/approach- The current study is based on qualitative methods (grounded theory) and quantitative (descriptive-analytical and survey). The required data was collected through the field methods (questionnaire and interview). The sample population of the study was determined to extract the indicators purposefully and based on the snowball method until the theoretical saturation of the interview with 18 people was reached. The statistical population of the study is the people living in the villages of Boyer-Ahmad County. 380 people in 10 rural settlements are assessed by employing Cochran's formula. The validity of the research questionnaire was confirmed by content validity and its reliability was confirmed by Cronbach's alpha. SPSS22 and ArcGis software were used for analyzing the data. Finding- In the index extraction stage, 51 concepts were identified in the form of 6 major categories. In the second stage, the results of one-sample t-test showed that rural settlements have a development coefficient of 0.35 in terms of the studied categories with an average of 2.46, which are at an undeveloped level. The status of development categories also shows that the category of environmental resources with an average of 3.31 has the best level and the category of quality of life with an average of 1.96 have the worst situation in the studied villages. The results also show that the Ganjeh Kohneh village with a coefficient of 0.43 and Mazdak village with a coefficient of 0.40 are in the middle development level and other settlements are in the undeveloped level. Practical implications- According to the results, solutions such as equitable distribution of services, development of a vision document for integrated development, diversification of economic activities and the use of social capital of villagers in the planning process have been proposed. Originality/value- Before planning at the local level, it is necessary to examine the views of the local community regarding rural development. There are differences between rural areas in terms of capabilities, talents, facilities and priorities, and local planning can take these differences into account.

Human settlements experience continual change. In recent years, many rural areas have experienced dispersed grow (rural sprawl) and population declines in traditional village centers (Hollowing). These paradoxical phenomena have occurred in most developing countries, including rural Iran. This study exامینes this phenomena in three Iranian villages of Kahak area of Qom province, and develops a model that can help predict how these trends will occur in the future. This study randomly selected 138 household for analysis. It analyzed eight variables that affect village development, including heritage, rural- urban migration, households’ structure changes, land price, quality of buildings, and geometrical shape of village. findings indicate that inheritance and migration variables have the highest influence on settlement transformation. Based on this analysis, it is predicted that among the there villages, Veshnave and Khurabad will maintain balanced population, but Abarjis will experience hollowing and decay.

Purpose - At the local level, the role of rural management in achieving optimal rural planning and development goals is significant. There are several approaches to rural management, one of which is good rural governance. In this regard, the purpose of this study is to evaluate the performance of new rural management with an emphasis on good governance indicators for the villages in the Central District of Karaj County. Design/methodology/approach - Quantitative approach was used in conducting this research. The statistical population of the study includes 7 villages. 145 households were sequentially determined based on random sampling and using the modified Cochran's formula. SPSS software and the FARAS model were utilized to analyze the data. Findings - The results showed that the situation of governance indicators in the studied villages is lower than average. In addition, the results of the correlation between the indicators of good rural governance showed that the management system is the desired and subject to development in all indicators of good rural governance from the point of view of the villagers. Also, the ranking of the indicators of good governance using the FARAS model substantiated that the social participation index has the highest rank from the experts’ point of view. Research limitations/implications - The outbreak of coronavirus interfered with the process of data collection and information in the studied villages. This impeded the process of completing the research. In this regard, to reduce the negative impact of this restriction, interviews and completing questionnaires were conducted through the Internet. Practical implications - Activities should be taken through the interaction of non-governmental organizations, governmental and public organizations, and the private sector, removing existing obstacles, and financial and executive constraints for modern rural management in the villages of the Central District. Originality/value: The study is conducted by the mentioned researchers and in accordance with the official rules and procedures, and all dissertations, articles, books, etc. were referred to accordingly. The originality of the present study is in applying the FARAS fuzzy model to the studied villages in the Central District of Karaj County.

Purpose- Nowadays, the smart growth approach plays a significant role in sustainable rural development. This approach seeks to improve the quality of human life and respond to socio-economic, environmental and physical problems and issues and can pave the way for rural management in order to make optimal use of facilities and solve rural problems. The purpose of this study is to identify and analyze the drivers of the effect of smart growth approach on sustainable development of rural settlements in Jiroft County. Design/methodology/approach- This study is applied research and it is descriptive-analytical in terms of nature. Data has been collected through documentary and field study. To extract the key drivers of the effect of smart growth approach on sustainable development of rural settlements in Jiroft county, a questionnaire has been prepared in the form of a Micmac questionnaire and distributed and completed among the sample community. 36 questionnaires were considered for rural experts, relevant organizations. The data analysis and structural analysis of the effect of smart growth approach indicators on the sustainable development of rural settlements were conducted using Micmac software. Finding- The results showed that among the 57 studied factors, 14 key effective drivers were identified that according to the high score of direct and indirect effect, factors such as utilizing existing infrastructure to increase villagers' employment and income, (direct (+10) indirect (+7205), improving land and housing prices in rural areas, direct (+9) indirect (+6959), villagers' satisfaction of increasing rural relations with outside (city and other villages), direct (+8) indirect (+8356) have the most effect compared to other drivers.

Purpose- Initial and preliminary review of distribution of rural settlements of Qazvin province indicates a special pattern in this province (the densely populated villages in some areas of the province and being devoid of population in some other villages) which has been changed during different census periods and it raises the following questions: what factors have created such a pattern? Do ecological factors play a role in the formation of this pattern? Hence, the purpose of the present study is to answer these questions.Design/methodology/approach- The present study was conducted using a descriptive-analytical method. First, the Getis-Ord Gi* statistic was used to review the spatial pattern of rural residents' network in Qazvin province, then k'luster analysis method through edge removal (SKATER) was used for grouping rural areas based on ecological conditions, and finally using the obtained results, the correlation coefficients between the ecological factors and the spatial distribution of the population in the obtained ecological groups were calculated. Findings- examining the spatial distribution pattern of rural settlements of Qazvin province according to Getis-Ord statistic indicates a cluster pattern of population spatial distribution in rural areas of Qazvin province. This pattern has high density in some areas and low density in other areas. The central parts of the province which include the Qazvin plain, have hot spots, and the northern areas of the province which include the mountainous areas, have cold spots. Based on the ecological grouping of villages through SKATER method and calculated correlation coefficients, the highest impact belonged to the grouping related to access to underground waters (existence of aquifer) and the next ranks belong to the distance from the river and slope. This shows the high impact of ecological variables on the distribution of rural population of the province during different periods.

Purpose- The use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has an effect on development of Creative Villages as a new approach in using the existing rural capabilities and capacities to revive the rural areas. This study seeks to analyze the impact of RICT on the indicators of development of Creative Villages in suburban settlements in Mashhad County.Design/methodology/approach- A descriptive-analytical research method was employed in this fundamental study, and documentary and survey methods have been used for collecting the data. The study population included households in 8 villages around Mashhad (N = 20813). These villages had a rural ICT office and a population of over 1,000 households. The sample was estimated using Cochran's formula; accordingly, 194 households were selected by systematic random sampling.Finding- Spatial analysis of the main variables was performed using Combined Compromise Solution and fuzzy gray analysis. The result showed that the villages of Gorji Sofla, Hosseinabad Gharghi, Dostabad and Dehroud have the highest, and the villages of Kal Zarkash and Chahar Borj have the lowest level of use of RICT services and the indicator of the Creative Village. Using the partial least squares (PLS) technique, among the research indicators, "promoting and training" with the coefficient of 0.591 had the most direct effect on the dependent variable. Also, variable dimension of "awareness of RICT services", considering the direct and indirect effects, with a coefficient of 0.816, has had a greater impact on the indicators of development of Creative Villages in rural settlements. Given the value of R2 (0.998), we concluded that RICT has a high-level impact on the indicators of development of Creative Villages.

Purpose- Nowadays, with the disappearance of traditionalism in rural housing design, constructions that deviate from the traditional and indigenous housing patterns are noticeable, and as a result, native values and traditions in rural housing have been disregarded. On the other hand, rural housing is the most humanistic subject of architecture and provides for the diverse needs of local residents. Therefore, this research was conducted with the aim of examining the effective factors in preserving the values of endemic housing and regional texture in Sistan towards revitalizing rural settlements.Design/ Methodology/ Approach- The qualitative-quantitative research method was used in the present study. The statistical population consisted of two parts: the first part included experts and graduates in architecture who were selected as a sample size of 20 people based on purposive sampling. The second part consisted of the villagers of Qaleh now, Deh Arbab, and Deh now Piran. Background field method, Delphi method, FARAS + FKOPRAS models were used to analyze data in both qualitative and quantitative sections.Finding- the results of background theory showed that from the perspective of experts, some factors such as preserving rural landscape, principles of protecting native housing values towards development with a focus on indigenous culture, interaction in preservation and revitalization of regional fabric and rural indigenous housing as well as cultural tourism in villages were identified as effective factors in preserving endemic rural housing values. Also, Delphi results showed that Kendall’s coefficient for concepts and meaningful units obtained from expert interviews did not differ significantly. In this regard, fuzzy model results showed that developing an ideal pattern for indigenous housing in Sistan with a weight of 70/72; principles of protecting native housing values towards development with a focus on indigenous culture with a weight of 66/72; integrated and cohesive management with a weight of 59/72, received the highest and lowest importance in preserving indigenous rural housing values in Sistan respectively.