Iranian Researchers Study Key Factors Affecting Regional Development with Foresight Methodology
Mehdi Bazzazzadeh (a Senior Expert in Regional Planning, Tarbiat Modares University) and his colleagues in an article entitled ‘studying and analysis of key factors affecting regional development with a regional foresight methodology; case study: West Azerbaijan Province, Iran’ used the existing studies in the field of regional development, noting that development criteria are classified into six groups of social, economic, political, environmental, science and technology, and spatial organization, and based on the available development documents, 18 components can play an important role in the regional development in West Azerbaijan province.
This research proposes that regional development as a structured concept and foresight as a new method with integration at the level of method and operational methods enjoy the ability to provide a framework as regional foresight.
This research states that agriculture, management style and communication infrastructure are three components that can play a key role in the development of West Azerbaijan.
It also provides a number of recommendations which can help the development of the province, including special attention to the activities of the agricultural sector and emphasis on industrialization and the use of new technologies in this field, special emphasis on directing agricultural production towards advantageous products like apples, grapes and other garden products, strengthening management and updating its application methods, improving the management level of the private sector and turning government intervention policies into guidance policies, improving the communication infrastructure, specially the road network, and emphasizing the development with a network system, paying attention to preserving the cultural diversity in the region and strengthening cultural ties through promoting the role and position of universities and scientific centers, maintaining the lines of separation and respecting different ethnic groups and obeying them on behalf of all groups, specially managers and provincial officials, emphasis on supporting conversion industries instead of basic industries with special attention to agricultural, food and pharmaceutical industries, strengthening the service sector of the economy by bolstering commercial and transit services, paying attention to the field of tourism as a complementary part of the economy with a special focus on attracting extra-regional domestic tourists, increasing the amount of investment by emphasizing the attraction of national level funds, strengthening constructive relations with foreign neighbors by emphasizing the procedure of cooperation and competition with a culture-oriented approach, strengthening the mining sector with an emphasis on gold, precious stones and jewelry mining industries, improving the level of knowledge and technology of the province and using new technologies as the main part in the development of science and technology in the region with special emphasis on nanotechnology, adoption of knowledge-based economic policy as the main part of the region's economy in all economic sub-sectors, and organizing the population settlement system and activity and service distribution system with a scattered-dense pattern through improving the level of population and services in the middle cities of the province.
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