Analysis of Factors Affecting Rural Livelihoods (The Case Study: Villages of Sardasht Township)

Different geographic environments, offer different potentials and problems in different fields especially in livelihood activities of their residents, attention to which gains a lot of importance in local and environmental programming. Thus identification and analysis of rural potentials and problems is an important step in the process of planning a sustainable rural development. Thus, in an explanatory and analytical approach. This study aims to assess the livelihood problems for villagers living in of Sardasht township based on its findings. This research was conducted based on documents and library as well as interpretations and field survey with a descriptive approach. The statistical population consists 5722 people from the top 50 households of 8 villages of Sardasht township 386 of which were selected the Morgan tables as a statistical sample by simple random sampling and its data was analyzed by SPSS software. Results show that, supply factors imposed the livelihoods in this villages were affected by environmental conditions including gardening and non-agricultural activities, being in a boundary region has also caused smuggling activities. Also results generally show that significant relationship exists between geographic factors such as land slope, access to educational level, distance from boundary area and different earning source of rural livelihoods all of which generated specific livelihood pattern for the villages in the region. Areas of the border also cause direct and indirect employment (freight transportation and passenger operations, loading, etc) that share a border of more than direct employment of indirect employment.