Assessment of the Social, Economic and Environmental Impacts of the Watershed Management Plan from the Perspective of the Villagers of Garmabad Watershed Basin in Fars Province

It is an undeniable principle that any activity done by humans on nature has effects on nature. In fact, these effects are a perspective of human activities and knowing them can show the strengths and weaknesses of programs. Therefore, specifying the type of changes, the factors involved in it and the consequences arising from it can have a significant impact on the better management of the programs and as a result reducing the negative consequences resulting from it and ultimately the successful implementation and stabilization of the programs. Therefore, the aim of the current research was to investigate the social, economic and environmental effects of the Garmabad village watershed project from the perspective of the watershed residents of this area in order to provide a suitable basis for the development of the project by evaluating the effects of the project and preparing and compiling basic solutions.

This research was a survey-based one. The statistical population of the study included all household heads (N=895) in Garmabad village located in Marvdasht county of Fars province, out of which 112 people were selected as the statistical sample by simple random sampling method. The data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire within which the face validity was confirmed based on the opinions of a number of subject-matter experts and its reliability was obtained by calculating the Cronbach's alpha coefficient for different parts of the questionnaire (0.65-0.84). The questionnaire consisted of two parts, in the first part, using 50 items in the form of a five-level Likert scale, the perception of the residents of the region about the effects (economic, social and environmental) of the watershed project was investigated, while the second part was allocated to investigate the personal and professional characteristics respondents. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS software. Some methods of descriptive statistics (such as frequency, mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (such as exploratory factor analysis) were used to analyze the data.

The results of factor analysis showed that in the field of environmental effects, four categories of factors such as creating a beautiful landscape and improving of infrastructure, controlling erosion and increasing the pasture area, rainfall productivity, and flood control and improving the village health status were able to explain 67.88% of variance of the effects of the environmental impacts. As a result of implementing the watershed plan with flood control, preventing soil erosion, sedimentation, increasing the area of pastures and vegetation, increasing underground water and wells, increasing water quality, etc., the productivity of water and soil has increased. Therefore, considering the arid and semi-arid conditions of the country and the importance of these two important factors on sustainable development, especially in rural areas, the attention of the government and the authorities for more investments and more principled policies in the field of implementation and comprehensive management of natural resources projects is essential for optimal use of water and soil.In the economic field, five factors including increasing the amount and the level of production, reducing production costs, increasing ownership and assets, increasing credits and rural development, and employment and income generation were the most important economic factors of the watershed management plan, which explained 71.80% of the variance in total. The results of this study show that the implementation of this plan has been able to solve the economic problems of the villagers to a large extent by increasing the amount of production and reducing production costs, increasing job opportunities, etc. Therefore, since the implementation of this project has been evaluated positively in improving the welfare of the villagers, it is better to develop this operation in villages that have the conditions to implement these projects.In the social field, the five factors including participation and cooperation, community stabilization, awareness improvement, institutional pursuit, and cultural exchange were able to explain 69.56% of the variance. According to the results obtained with the implementation of the project, the solidarity and interaction between the people of the village has increased and a suitable ground has been provided for cultural exchanges and tourism development. Therefore, it can be acknowledged that the success of any project depends on social and cultural issues in addition to technical and executive issues, and people's active participation is very effective, especially in watershed management projects.

The results of this research generally show that the watershed project had many positive effects on the studied area. Therefore, in order to improve the project, it is recommended to take advantage of the capabilities of local communities and stakeholders in this context, and it is effective to consider the interests of the beneficiaries in designing and implementing the plan, using their local knowledge, using the influence of local leaders to attract the participation of villagers, etc.