Design and Simulation of Beef Value Chain in Mashhad City Using: System Dynamic Approach

The price of red meat has grown significantly in recent years, which has reduced the welfare of the consumers of this product, and its consumption has decreased greatly in the low-income groups of the society. The presence of many challenges in the beef value chain and the presence of many activists with different goals in this chain have made it complicated and difficult to analyze this chain. One of the best methods for designing complex systems, determining policies and solving their problems is system dynamics modeling.

In this study, after identifying the actors in the value chain, the relationships among the elements of this system were expressed in the form of causal loop diagram. Then, the types of the variables in the system were determined including stock, rate, auxiliary and parameters and the stock-flow diagram of this value chain was drawn and then was formulated. After validating the designed model using the behavior reproduction test, the current state of this value chain has been simulated.

In this basic model, by creating scenarios on key variables such as the exchange rate and the import tariff rate of inputs and red meat, it is possible to examine the impact of various government support policies on the price of beef and other important variables of this chain.SuggestionsTherefore, such a model that shows the dynamics of the relationships between the factors involved in the red meat value chain can be used as an operational dashboard for decision making for policy makers and planners of the country's agricultural sector.