Preparing the model for environmental training to strengthen the sustainable ‎governance of national water resources with an emphasis on public participation

Studies have shown that most of the existing problems in the water sector are the outcomes of unsustainable methods of development caused by unawareness and lack of public training. Researchers have found that the social systems and mechanisms affecting water cycle are beyond the scope of water management and that the issue of water crisis must be addressed in the frame of social entities and systems, which are known as the water governance. The objective of this study is to identify the criteria and indicators of sustainable governance and to prepare an appropriate training program towards its realization. The tool for evaluation was a questionnaire and the research methodology was of descriptive survey. The validity of the indicators was established by taking into account the views and comments of relevant scholars and experts, and the reliability of the indicators was calculated as 0.869 using the Cronbach’s alpha formula. All criteria and indicators were graded in the fuzzy environment using the relevant software. The results show the criterion of public participation to be more sustainable than other governance criteria, while the indicators of training scored higher than others. Since the realization of sustainable governance becomes facilitated by increasing public awareness about the importance of environmental issues, the research proposes an appropriate training model to increase public participation.