Evaluation of the Perception of Some Farmers in the Chehelchay Watershed towards Soil Erosion

Soil plays an important role in sustainable development. Therefore, protecting and controlling of soil erosion greatly contributes to the well-being, security and sustainability of societies. In order to solve the growing problems of the country in the field of natural resource destruction and soil erosion, assessment of farmers' awareness about soil erosion and their perception and attitudes toward soil erosion phenomena would be essential. Because perception is a kind of mental inclination and the main cause of behavior changes, and hence changing the perceptions alters human behavior. Hence, the study of people's perceptions in different fields would be important to help managers and executives to be aware of people's ways of thinking about specific issues, and if necessary, to develop some plans to change the people's perceptions. Therefore, the main goal of this research is to understand the perception of the farmers of the Chehlchay watershed in Golestan province towards soil erosion. Also, appropriate training methods, the effect of some human factors on soil erosion and the reasons for not implementing conservation works at the level of agricultural fields from the farmers' point of view are surveyed and is introduced as sub-objectives of this research.

In this study, to understand farmers' perception on soil erosion, a conceptual model with seven components including familiarity and understanding of the concept of soil erosion, the effect of natural factors on soil erosion, the effect of human factors on soil erosion, responsibility for causing soil erosion, the consequences of soil erosion, how to deal with soil erosion and control and prevention of soil erosion was designed and following this model, 45 items were defined to cover all aspects of this model. Then, 200 questionnaires were filled out with face-to-face interview with farmers in four villages and the results were analyzed. Statistical analysis of the questionnaires was performed using SPSS software.

In this research, Cronbach's alpha coefficient was estimated 0.804. The results of this research showed that about 31% of farmers have more than average knowledge of soil erosion, 22% have average knowledge and 37% have less than average knowledge. Also, the results of evaluating the scores of the seven components of the conceptual model of farmers' perception towards soil erosion showed that the farmers with an average score of 2.4, 2.3, and 2. 2 had the lowest level of awareness, respectively.

According to the presented data on the awareness of farmers in the region, in general, the majority of farmers (about 68%) have intermediate and low knowledge about the phenomenon of soil erosion, so it can be concluded that the farmers' low knowledge and inappropriate perception about soil erosion causes insufficient attention to be paid in this regard and therefore no serious works are carried out to improve the soil erosion in the region. Therefore, according to the significance of the relationship between the level of education and the amount of education and promotion about soil erosion, it is suggested that by improving the provision of educational and promotional services, a background is provided for improving the perception of farmers in the region. Additionally, by increasing the awareness of farmers, an effective step will be taken to improve the rate of soil erosion in the upstream watersheds.