Extension Mechanisms to Support Sustainable Agriculture in Iran Context

Sustainable agriculture, as a managerial philosophy has risen to meet environmental, economic and social complications. Agricultural extension as a source of information plays an important role for the achievement of sustainable forms of agriculture. In fact, conventional extension system cannot accomplish sustainability in agriculture. The objective of the study was to identify the most appropriate mechanism to support dimensions and policies of sustainable agriculture that used a descriptive-correlative design. The population of this study consisted of faculty members of agricultural extension education, extension head in provinces and extension specialists of deputy of agricultural extension and farming system in the Ministry of Agriculture in Iran. A sample consisting 87 respondents was selected through simple random sampling. The instrument used to achieve objectives of the study was a questionnaire by reliability 0.86. Findings indicate that Iran's sustainable agricultural extension mechanisms are not favorable and the extension system does not pay enough attention to them. These conditions necessitate rethinking of extension mechanisms to accomplish sustainable agriculture. When examining the results of the Canonical correlation analysis, it reveals that the Wilks Lambda test was significant at 0.01 level. It indicates that the first squared Canonical correlation (R_{2 C} (1)) was statistically significant. Based on the Canonical correlation analysis, on the predicator variables set, "assets of sustainable agriculture development", "supportive extension organizations toward sustainability", "content of sustainable agriculture extension" and "professionals of sustainable agriculture extension", loaded highest on Canonical function one and had the most impact upon policies and dimensions of sustainable agriculture.