ABSTRACT: Replacing rice cultivation is a measure that mitigates water scarcity and climate change. This study used the extended theory of planned behavior (TPB) to predict rice growers’ intentions to alter their current rice cropping system to other, less water-consumptive products. Using survey data collected from 220 randomly sampled rice growers in southwestern Iran, structural equation modeling showed that environmental concerns positively affected the subjective norm (β = 0.57), perceived behavioral control (β = 0.16), moral norm (β = 0.37), self-identity (β = 0.26), and habit (β = 0.39). Environmental concerns indirectly affect farmers’ intentions through self-identity and habit. Attitude and self-identity positively affected and habit negatively affected behavioral intentions. The results showed that the extended TPB has superior predictive ability over TPB in predicting grower intentions. Extended TPB predicted 35% of the farmers’ intentions, while TPB predicted 30%. Given the strong indirect impact of environmental concerns on the farmers’ intention to change cultivation patterns, political efforts through the media and training campaigns should be aimed at raising environmental concerns, risk perception and awareness, and clarifying the risks of water scarcity. Extension agents may increase farmers’ willingness to change cultivated crops by disseminating information to farmers about measures needed to prepare the land, costs of cultivating alternative crops, and benefits of changing cultivation patterns to improve farmers’ attitudes.
KEY WORDS: Water scarcity · Environmental concern · Habit · Change cropping system
Full text in pdf format | Cite this article as: Yazdanpanah M, Zobeidi T, Sieber S, Löhr K, Homayoon SB
(2022) Replacing rice with lower water consumption crops: green policy implications for Iran. Clim Res 88:101-114. https://doi.org/10.3354/cr01700
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