Development of A Desirable Business Model in the Value Chain of Rice Products in Mazandaran Province

The development or creation of value chains of agricultural products is the basic solution to improve the production, marketing and trading of agricultural products because the profit from it goes to the agents and actors of that chain, especially the producers. The purpose was to develop a desirable business model in the value chain of rice products in Mazandaran province. The population was all market participants and traders of agricultural products, processing factories, top producers and organizations involved and related to agricultural products, especially rice in Mazandaran province. The Purposive sampling method was used. Focus groups and collaborative meetings with a brainstorming approach were used for data collection with interviewing 20 people by questionnaire. The Analytic Hierarchy Process method and Expert Choice11 software were used for analyzing data. Based on the main criteria and sub-criteria, a suitable business model for Mazandaran rice value chain was developed. The results showed that the Orchestra model with a relative weight (0.328) was the optimal model for the development and extension of the rice value chain in Mazandaran.