Reviewing the Forests and Rangelands Policies of the First to Sixth Economic, Cultural and Social Development Plans of the Islamic Republic of Iran

The country's five-year development plans are the most important policy documents in which development goals and strategies are codified based on the country's ambitions, abilities, facilities and environmental conditions and serve as a guidline for governance of the country.The purpose of this study was to investigate the policies presented in the first to sixth development plans (1990-2021) of Iran about forest and rangeland. Herein, the study was performed by grounded theory method. The policies were categorized in the open coding. The relationship between categories was determined in the axial coding. The mentioned relationship was described in the selective coding. The results of open coding showed that 25 policy categories were presented in the development plans. In the axial coding, conservation, restoration, and sustainable use of forest and rangeland resources were selected as core category which were the the goals of plans. Other 24 policy categories were classified according to Phenomenon in three sections of the strategies (14 categories), context conditions (4 categories) and intervening conditions (6 categories). The results of selective coding showed that diversity and continuity of the policies varies from one to five plans.