The Role of Indigenous Knowledge by the Rural People in Decreasing Susceptibility of Rural Habitations in Terms of Environmental Risks (A Case Study of the Central Part of Jiroft District)

One of the significant factors in demolishing the rural habitations in Iran is environmental risks like earthquakes, droughts and floods. It seems that the main cause of aggravation of such crises in recent decades is the exogenous approaches and the concentrated projects and the lack of attention to the endogenous, non-centered, local, participatory approaches, and the lack of attention to the knowledge and experiences of the natives and their contributions to the prophylaxis, the preparation, and reactions to the environmental risks and managing the crises. In this regard, the villages belonging to Jiroft in particular the central part of this city have faced some risks like floods and drought sin recent decades; thus, it is prone to more damages. Methodologically speaking, this research is descriptive-analytical. The subjects of the study consist of the all villagers of the central part of Jiroft. Twelve villages and 261 head households were chosen randomly, the population of the study was calculated running Cochran formula. The data achieved through survey studies were analyzed via SPSS. The results revealed that the risks of droughts and floods were the main environmental risks in this study, and it highly decreased the level of susceptibility of the villages.The level of Indigenous knowledge and of its effectiveness in the scope of this study was higher than average (3). And also there was significant association with age and the level of indigeonous knowledg but there was no association with gender and the type of their occupation.