Analysis of obstacles to the development of rural handicraft cooperatives market in Sistan and Baluchestan province

Although Sistan and Baluchestan Province is renowned for its handicrafts and has the potential ‎to contribute significantly to the local economy, the industry has not yet met expectations. The ‎downturn in demand in the handicraft market has not only eroded the incentive to enter this ‎industry, but also made some people unemployed in this area and had other side effects, such as ‎an increase in rural-to-city migration and the lack of production of some handicrafts. In this ‎regard, the purpose of this study is to evaluate and rate barriers to market development in the ‎handicraft cooperatives of this province. The present research is applied and quantitative and ‎the required information has been extracted using questionnaires and interviews with activists ‎and experts of this field in Sistan and Baluchestan province. A total of 40 questionnaires were ‎collected in 2022 and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The results show that ‎the limited holding of national or international exhibitions of handicrafts, investors' ‎unwillingness to invest in handicrafts due to restrictive mechanisms and inadequate public ‎propaganda to recognize the effects of handicrafts (especially tourists) are the most important ‎barriers to the development of handicraft market are. The lack of design and use of integrated ‎and scientific marketing systems for selling products by manufacturing companies, and the ‎inability to sell handmade products directly by manufacturers, are also serious barriers to the ‎lack of development of the province's handicraft market. However, the mismatch of provincial ‎handicraft production with consumer tastes, diversity and product attractiveness is not a serious ‎obstacle to the development of crafts markets. ‎