Explaining the Effective Factors and Challenges in the Development of the Value Chain of Sheep Meat in Lorestan Province

Today, global competition, changing markets and new technologies by creating value chains have led to increased value in manufactured products. The purpose of creating value chains, especially in the livestock sector, is to improve performance, reduce operating costs and reveal opportunities in the business. Recognition of the effective factors and obstacles in the sheep value chain is one of the most important factors of the development of these chains. Thus, in this study, effective factors and the challenges facing the development of the value chain of sheep meat in Lorestan province were studied. The main paradigm of research was mixed. In the quality section, 43 people were selected through the targeted and snowball method. In the quantitative section, 382 people were selected and examined in two stages by the simple cluster sampling method. The results showed that social problems explain 24.21% of the variance of the challenges facing the development of sheep value chain in Lorestan province, management problems 14.21%, financial problems 8.67% and technical problems 6.67%. Modeling of interactive structural equations in SMART-PLS3 software showed that the overall goodness-of-fit criteria of the confirmatory factor analysis had a moderate fit in the current model. Then, the measurement model showed that the economic factor, government policies and information technology with a coefficient of determination of 35% have the greatest role in the development of the value chain of mutton in Lorestan province. In this regard, in the present study strategies have been proposed to reduce the cost of the sheep meat value chain through governmental policies and exploiting the opportunities hidden in information and communication technology.