Physical Development of Rural Settlements in Iran and Enhancing Sustainable Food Production

Food production, food security and self-sufficiency are among the strategic concerns of communities around the world. FAO announced that in 2050 the amount of food production must be doubled. Villages are the primary responsible places for food production through agriculture and animal husbandry activities. Accordingly, the spatial organization of villages and rural houses has been highly influenced by food production activities. Current rural development projects in Iran, however, have paid little attention to this productive role of villages. The design of these projects is mainly inspired by modern urban planning and development models, imported from the West. Aside from the elimination of rural spatial and architectural identity as well as weakening of social relations, these projects undermine the importance of food production in these settlements. It is, therefore, critical to propose a conceptual framework for planning the future development of villages, while supporting their food production activities. The first part of this article examines the main characteristics of villages across the country to find out main factors and influential principles that shape these settlements. Theories of green urbanism have been adopted in order to identify those physical aspects of rural settlements that are related to food production activities. The findings of this study show that the concept of "agrarian urbanism" can provide a proper framework for the physical development of rural settlements. The idea of the physical development of human settlements based on production, consumption and trade of agricultural and horticultural products will strengthen the food production role of villages. This theory, proposed and developed by Duany and DPZ, aims at enhancing the quality of life within all transects mainly based on food production and provides some suggestions within the framework of green urbanism to shape and develop the spatial organization of different types of human settlements. This study adopts a deductive approach and is based on a literature review, which compares theories concerned with food production and their influence on human settlements in the context of Iranian villages.