A comprehensive map and prioritization of the provinces producing medicinal plants in the country based on the indicators of the physical advantage of production

Determining the relative advantage of agricultural products in different regions is one of the important dimensions of agricultural policy and planning, based on which the appropriate pattern of production and cultivation can be achieved in different regions according to the conditions in each region. The current research aims to prioritize the provinces that produce medicinal plants in the country based on the indicators of the physical advantage of production (advantage of scale, efficiency advantage and collective advantage) and their fluctuation coefficient during the period of 2011-2018 using the numerical taxonomy method. The results showed that during a period of 18 years, South Khorasan, Jiroft and Razavi Khorasan provinces had the highest average scale advantage index (SAI) and the highest average efficiency advantage (EAI) was also in Alborz, West Azarbaijan and Lorestan provinces with 13/67 respectively. , 6/47 and 6/19 were obtained. According to the results of collective advantage (AAI), the provinces of Hamadan, Semnan and Sistan and Baluchistan have the lowest fluctuation coefficient of collective index with 0.26, 0.28 and 0.33 and the provinces of Alborz, Jiroft and Sistan and Baluchistan with 31.40 respectively. 2.3 and 1.65 had the highest average collective advantage among all the provinces of the country. Finally, in order to summarize, using GIS software, a comprehensivemap of the country for medicinal plants was drawn based on the indicators of physical advantage.