An assessment of farmers’ social resilience level in the face of water-based crises: The case of Haris County

Water-based incidents are natural phenomena that have posed Iran to serious crises. Despite efforts to settle water crises and improve the conditions, we still witness a growing trend of water issues, especially in the agricultural sector in Iran. A necessary step to face water-based incidents and alleviate their implications is to have a deep understanding of resilience dimensions to enhance the tolerance level of the farmers. The present study evaluated farmers’ resilience level in the face of water-based crises in Harsin County. The research, which adopted a descriptive survey methodology, was conducted in 2020. The statistical population was composed of the heads of rural households in four rural districts of the county, amounting to about 6000 people. The sample size was determined to be 361 farmers based on Morgan’s table. The measurement instrument was a questionnaire whose validity was confirmed by a panel of experts and professionals and its reliability was confirmed for all sections as their Cronbach’s alpha was estimated at >0.8. SPSS was used for data analysis and Expert Choice was used for pairwise comparisons. Based on the results of the pairwise comparisons, infrastructural resilience to drought has the highest level of importance in the concept of resilience. According to the results of the study, the resilience level was evaluated to be relatively low in all studied rural districts, and the difference in the level of resilience among the studied villages is significant. Also, farmers with irrigated farming have a higher level of resilience than farmers with rainfed farming.