An Opinion Survey of Iranian Sarough Subdistrict People about Challenges of Sustainable Rural Development

Considering the importance of achieving continuous economic growth and ultimately development, the present study examined the problems and constraints existing on the way to development. After studying and extracting indicators of sustainable development and giving an explanation of its challenges a questionnaire was prepared to survey the opinion of Sarough subdistrict people. The challenges and their contribution to explaining variances of sustainable rural development in view of rural people were respectively obtained as follows: sustainability of forest areas, soil and water, 25.5%; development projects, 14.2%; sustainable use of environmental reserves, 13.1%; institutional environment, 10.1%; health and people appropriate handling of pesticides, 7.7%; and sustainable forms of human settlements 3.3%. The mentioned six factors could explain 85% of total variances which can be regarded as a high percentage.