Commercialization of Academic Research in Agricultural Higher Education: Barrier Analysis

This descriptive and applied research was carried out with the purpose of identifying and categorizing barriers of commercialization of university agricultural research. This survey research was done by a three-round Delphi technique. Using purposive sampling approach (a combination of reputational and chain sampling techniques), 23 agricultural faculty members experienced in the purposeful commercialization were selected as the participants in this study. In the first round, 27 barriers in the way of the commercialization of university agricultural research were extracted applying a qualitative content analysis of participant's responses. In the second round, the integrated list of barriers was categorized in three groups, including (1) structural barriers (18 items), (2) behavioral – process barriers (21 items), and (3) context- environment barriers (16 items). Cronbach alpha coefficient as the criterion of reliability was calculated between .69 and .81 for three categories of barriers in the second and third round, separately. In the third round, the three groups of barriers were analyzed through Topsis. As the results showed, most important barriers of commercialization of university agricultural research are: Low quality and little commercial capability of research findings (structural barrier), lack of an established procedure for commercialization of university research (behavioral barrier), and lack of appropriate accessibility to support services (contextual barrier).