Impact assessment of the performance of rural household’s heads on theirperceptions toward environmental sustainability in Baghmalek County

Environmental sustainability represents material and non-material actions that provide key information on environmental impacts, compliance, stakeholder relationships, and organizational systems and represent definitions of the effectiveness and productivity of environmental actions. Environmental performance means the amount of impact that physical activity has on the environment . It highlights the environmental sustainability dimensions and assesses the performance of policies and programs of countries in reducing environmental problems, environmental protection and natural resource management. The purpose of this research was to analysis  the effects of villagers environmental performance on their perception toward environmental sustainability in Baghmalek county.

The present study is quantitative  in terms of its nature and objectives, a descriptive survey in terms of data collection, and a correlation study in terms of analyzing the data. Statistical population of the study was rural households heads in central region of Baghmalek township located at Khuzestan Province (N=3005). Sample size determined via Krejcie and Morgan’s table (n=341). Sampling method was proportional stratified random sampling. Research instrument was questionnaire. Which its face and content validity were confirmed a by panel of experts. To determine the reliability of the research tool, a pilot test was conducted that the Cronbach's alpha values for the main scales of the questionnaire was in the desirable range (0.78 to 0.91).

The results of descriptive statistics showed that the mean of respondents' perception toward environmental sustainability was 3.66 out of 6. Also, the calculated mean for environmental performance was 3.79 out of 6. Among the components of environmental performance, consumption with average (4.36 out of 6) and recycling with average (3.45 out of 6) had the highest and lowest priority, respectively. The results of structural equation modeling showed that the values of composite reliability (CR) and extracted mean variance (AVE) calculated for environmental performance components were obtained at optimum level. Considering the significant correlation between environmental performance components, this structure had logical validity. The results of the measuring coefficients of the items of respondents' perception toward environmental sustainability showed that the value of the AVE was at the appropriate level and the CR was at the optimum level. Also, there was significant correlations between items of perception showed that this variable had acceptable logical validity. The findings of structural equation modeling (SEM) showed that environmental performance had positive and significant effect on the respondents perception toward environmental sustainability. So that this variable explained 13 percent of the variance in perception. Also, results showed that three components of environmental performance (consumption, institutional and recycling) had positive and significant effect on the respondents perception toward environmental sustainability. So that these components could explain 24 percent of the of the variance in respondents perception.

As a general conclusion, it can be said that in the villages under study, environmental behavior needs to be adequately informed about environmental performance. As a result, as villagers' skills lead to higher levels of positive environmental performance,  will perform more environmentally friendly behaviors that can help promote environmental sustainability.