Fars Olive Grower's Attitude towards Impacts of Olive Orchards Development

Olive orchards development project has been considered as one of the cores in national agricultural sector improvement. Therefore, a large amount of public fund has been allocated to that project. But, the project has had different impacts on its beneficiaries. Regarding to widespread development of olive cultivation in Fars Province, assessing the project impacts is necessary in order to maximize its benefits and minimize its negative effects. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the environmental, social and economic impacts assessment of olive orchards development in Fars province from the olive growers’ perspective by using survey technique. Olive orchard area in Fars province is about 8370 hectares consisting about 300 olive growers. Based on Tockman sample size table, 170 olive growers were selected as sample group. Questionnaire was the instrument for data gathering. Stratified random sampling was used to collect data among 170 olive growers as the sampling method. The questionnaire validity and reliability was examined by using face validity and Cronbach’s Alpha test (its coefficients were from 0.80 to 0.91). Findings revealed olive growers’ satisfaction towards the project regarding their assessment toward its environmental, social and economic impacts was in very low level. According to multiple regression analysis, the below factors can explain about 55 percent of overall impact assessment variations of the project: olive growers’ satisfaction toward the project; benefiting of extension services; and membership in cooperatives. Some applicable recommendations have presented at the end.