Surveying the Economic Efficiency of Rural Production Cooperatives and Prioritization of their Problems in the Management Process and the Marketing System

Cooperatives have an important role in rural development in a way that they are mentioned as a part of the dynamic and active agricultural environment and as a way to the agricultural world. The studies on the production cooperatives clarified that the cooperatives have a significant role in making important decisions. Agricultural cooperatives are so important in the development of agricultural efficiency that may help to the economic welfare of the farmers. Agricultural cooperatives as one of the most important sources producing agricultural productions are among the suppliers of food security of Iran. According to the statistics and information in this field, nowadays agricultural production cooperative companies provide more than 30% of the products like wheat, barley, rape, sugar beet, cotton, corn and potato. The existing cooperatives have not been that successful so far due to reasons like lack of credit, weak financial basis, inadequate capital, lack of the required training for team work, their inability in omitting brokers and mediators, poor management, the disappointment of the members for the function of cooperative, lack of sufficient expert personnel, law quality of the machinery and poor notification. Regarding the numerous problems of cooperatives, a comprehensive planning for solving the problems is required. These factors result in decrease performance and consequently efficiency drop. The role of management in cooperatives is an effective factor in their efficiency and performance. With the above- mentioned items in mind, estimating the performance of cooperatives in order to compare the managerial abilities of each of the cooperatives, the efficiency of production cooperatives in Khalil Abad, Kashmar and Bardaskan around the province of Khorasan Razawi has been fulfilled.

In this study, random data envelopment analysis with random scenario approach (SDEA) was chosen in order to estimate the economic efficiency of rural production cooperatives in Tarshiz (Plain Khalil Abad, Kashmar and Bardaskan). Analytical Hierarchy (AHP) approach and entropy criterion were used to prioritize the problems of rural production cooperatives in these cities in the management process and marketing system.
Generally, in the common DEA models, the exact data is used for measuring the efficiency of decision units. Since a person who wants to make decision is confronted with risky situation and uncertainty, it is not possible to determine the exact amount of inputs and outputs and this may put the precision of the model under question. In order to solve this shortcoming and enter the risky terms and uncertainty in determining the efficiency of each decision making unit, Random Data Envelopment Analysis can be used.
In this study, the statistical information of the year 2019-2020 which was collected by completing a questionnaire and face-to-face interviews with 220 members of the selected cooperatives. The studied units include 60 rural production cooperatives. For this, Excel, GAMS and Eviews software have been used for their analysis.

This study aims to estimate the efficiency and the effective factors on efficiency of production cooperatives in the above-mentioned cities. In order to follow a set of national policies and fulfill them to reach to a required level of efficiency in cooperatives some actions should be taken. Therefore, in order to provide strong results random Data Envelopment Analysis with random inputs to estimate the efficiency of the cooperatives, separate local studies and categorization based on their efficiency and optimization was conducted. The results showed that the range between the most efficient and the inefficient ones are so wide and with promoting managerial factors from the efficient ones to the inefficient ones, increasing profitability would be possible.
According to the results, the level of efficiency in agricultural cooperatives of these cities is more than average and is relatively efficient. The average of economic efficiency in agricultural cooperatives in the studied areas is 74% and it is possible to promote it up to 26%.
Based on the data collected, there is a direct relationship between CEO’s level of education and economic efficiency in a way that the more educated the CEO, the more efficient the cooperative. Also, the distance of the cooperative from the city center has the direct effect on economic efficiency of the cooperatives. As it is shown variables like the education of the CEO, the distance of the cooperative to city center, participating in training classes and investing in cooperatives have a positive and meaningful effect on the efficiency of the cooperatives. Other factors which were analyzed about efficiency are the number of members in cooperative age and risk taking of the CEO but they were not considerably effective on the efficiency of cooperatives.

The results of random data envelopment analysis (SDEA) showed that the average random efficiency of rural production cooperatives in three cities is 74% and is at a relatively moderate level. The efficiency of private sector cooperatives (83%) is more efficient than the state-managed sector (73%). The results of the hierarchical analysis model (AHP) showed that inappropriate policies in pricing and price fluctuations of agricultural products, low services in the field of packaging, processing, marketing and distribution of products and lack of comprehensive long-term planning by managers (lack of marketing research) are priors in, respectively, the inefficiency of the management process and marketing system of rural production cooperatives in our cities. It is suggested to create an independent unit in the rural production cooperatives of the region in the field of obtaining information about the daily price trends of products in the domestic and global markets in order to reach farmers support the marketing system.