Analysis of Farm Land Management in Iranian Agricultural Corporations: Challenges and Problems

The concept of farm management systems in Iran especially that of Farm Corporation, dates back to the land reform of the early 1960s and has eversince formed a major cornerstone of all sustainable agricultural development plans. Fragmentation and dispersion of farm lands along with the lack of effective farm production management systems due to the absence of major landlords have led to the disruption of farm production and management systems over a major portion of agricultural lands in Iran. The need is now urgent for provisions to reorder the ownership of farm lands that broke down into small parcels and to restore land uses that changed over time due to such factors as property inheritance. Farm corporations have emerged as tools to aggregate such small fragmented parcels of land into large productive units, prevent the division of agricultural lands into small non-economic plots, increase the area under cultivation, improve agricultural productivity, enhance farm yields, eke out farmer per capita income, and acquaint farmers with modern farm technologies. The present study is a literature review aimed at developing solution(s) for reorganizing small agricultural land parcels into agricultural corporations and to investigate the associated challenges and problems. It was found the challenges such corporations commonly face include their reliance on the capabilities and proper actions of a single individual as the CEO, lack of financial incentives for employees due to their fixed pays, the absence of opportunities for nurturing farmer managerial and entrepreneurial talents, wrong decisions on crop patterns made by top managers with no heed paid to local conditions which often lead to great losses due to mismatches between cultivated crops and local limitations, nonexistence of qualified managers, and the low service life (usually not more than 2 to 3 years) of managers who abandon their jobs due to insufficient compensation often accompanied by the housing problem. Based on these findings, it is suggested that the Central Rural Cooperative Organization adopt appropriate strategies that facilitate the development of agricultural corporations by addressing the challenges cited above.