Factors affecting the availability and relevance of technology for wheat producers in Iran : a study of the Agricultural Knowledge and Information System (AKIS)

A combination of socio-economic, cultural and political reasons have led Iran to pursue two important national objectives: self-sufficiency in food and support poor farmers. The chosen operational strategy aims at intensification of agriculture by creating conditions for productivity increase. This has been done by introducing high yielding varieties and high external inputs and by setting up various support institutions, in order to provide access to goods and services and a regulatory structure of laws and incentives.However, the efforts of the government have not resulted in the achievement of the national objectives. At the national level, two problems remain: the country imports a large amount of food and the production of small farmers is low. At the field level, the continuing existence of yield gaps is the problem.At the field level, by examining the claims and benefits of the technologies introduced and of the institutional efforts made, the study reveals that farmers, especially small farmers, have difficulty in adopting the technologies. The lack of adoption results from their lack of access to the development mix including the incentive structure, market, inputs, irrigation, relevant technologies, etc. This in turn has its root in institutional and policy factors.At the institutional level, we observe that the research, extension, training institutions (as the institutions directly involved in providing access to relevant technologies), and farmers, lack synergy amongst their tasks. This results from problems in task differentiation amongst the actors, poor integration between the tasks of the actors and weak or no coordination amongst the actors. Furthermore, the actors lack a conducive environment in which to perform effectively. A number of factors related to policy-making, bureaucratic and political structures, the institutions in charge of providing goods and services for farmers, the black market and the national and international research institutes, further hinder the effective performance of the actors.At the policy level, the situation is problematic with respect to both general and technology policies. In all, we can say the policy environment is not conducive to the achievement of the stated objectives.