عوامل پیش‌برنده و بازدارنده موثر در تحقق‌پذیری توسعه روستای هوشمند (مورد مطالعه: روستاهای بخش مرکزی شهرستان مشگین شهر)

Introduction:

Smart Village introduces an integrated approach to designing rural settlements that aims to improve the living standards of residents while making rural housing and lifestyles more environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable. The term smart, which has emerged in the concepts of smart cities and smart homes, is synonymous with connectivity to the internet and digital technology. A smart village is a village where the needs of residents and people’s infrastructure are met, leading to improved comfort and performance for residents. At the same time, it is cost-effective and supports the construction of houses that benefit from new technologies while reflecting and supporting traditional methods in construction design and operation that are appropriate in their place (Dolvi et al., 2019: 14). In general, connecting the country’s urban and rural settlements to the smart technology channel is considered vital and important to reach the development train, and undoubtedly the villages of Meshginshahr County are not unaffected in laying the rails of this locomotive of progress. Among the problems and issues of the villages of Meshginshahr County, we can mention issues such as unemployment, the dependence of the rural community on the agricultural sector, in some cases the monoculture of agricultural activities, the lack of diversity of job activities, the low level of income, the lack of public services and facilities, the low level of health and education, environmental problems and the energy crisis, etc. in a large part of the rural community; solving all of the aforementioned issues requires a specific planning and strategy that, while being cost-effective, has the least environmental impact and ensures the development of rural areas. These interpretations make the implementation of smart villages in the aforementioned areas necessary. To do this, first, the factors that promote and inhibit the development of smart villages and the indicators of smartization in the areas under study must be identified. Therefore, in this research, in order to explain and help make villages smart, an attempt will be made to study the factors that promote and inhibit the realization of smart villages in the villages of the central part of Meshginshahr County.

Methodology:

The present study was conducted in the form of descriptive-analytical research and, from the perspective of the research objectives, is an applied research. To collect the data and information required for this study, two documentary/library and field methods were used. In such a way that the necessary information regarding the theoretical foundations and the study area was collected through the library and documentary methods, and the required data was collected through the field method from the residents of the villages and experts of the villages in the central part of Meshginshahr county , by distributing and completing a questionnaire. The analysis method is descriptive and inferential. In the descriptive statistics section, percentages, frequencies, graphs, central and dispersion indices are used. In the inferential statistics section, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test is used to determine the type of distribution. Then, the structural equation test in the LISREL software is used to analyze the information obtained from the experts' questionnaire. In connection with the residents' questionnaire, the non-parametric binomial test is used to examine the status of villages in terms of inhibiting and promoting factors affecting the development of smart villages. The Kruskal-Wallis test is used to rank villages in terms of inhibiting and promoting factors affecting the development of smart villages in the SPSS software.

Findings:

The findings show that; according to the factor loading estimates, the infrastructure-physical factor (with an effect coefficient of 0.907), the economic variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.879), the management variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.867), the environmental variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.812), and the socio-cultural variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.695) are the most important inhibiting factors affecting smart rural development, respectively. Also, the human capital factor (with an effect coefficient of 0.924), the physical-infrastructure factor (with an effect coefficient of 0.907), the environmental factor (with an effect coefficient of 0.892), the socio-cultural variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.852), and the economic variable (with an effect coefficient of 0.805) are the most important driving factors affecting smart rural development, respectively. The results of the Kruskal-Wallis test also showed that in terms of inhibitory factors, the three villages of Vali Abad (score 182.65), Baris (score 169.17) and Naser Abad (score 163.53) have the highest and the three villages of Kojang (score 51.05), Alni (score 48.53) and Barzil (score 17.56) have the lowest inhibitory factors for smart village development. In terms of promoting factors, the three villages of Alni (score 23.159), Kojang (score 147.05) and Parikhan (score 93.133) have the highest promoting factors and the three villages of Naser Abad (score 21.57), Baris (score 52.60) and Vali Abad (score 09.65) have the lowest promoting factors for smart village development.

Discussion and Conclusion:

One of the promising and facilitating forms of the sustainable development process of rural areas is the idea of combining the need for development based on endogenous resources that are stimulated from the bottom up and the need to maintain and develop external connections and benefit from exogenous innovative potential. The smart village approach can use local resources by creating social and human capital and developing cooperation networks and creating local innovation systems, system competitiveness, economic growth to improve human living conditions. Rural areas located in the sphere of influence of large urban agglomerations have more favorable conditions for the practical implementation of the smart village concept due to better access to new digital and professional technologies, network institutions and closer proximity to experts and managers. The integration of the smart village concept is largely conditioned by localization, as well as the specific social and economic nature of each region, which is defined by the characteristics of a given local system and its local community. The vulnerability of a particular community, the ability to absorb innovations and the skills to acquire them are very important. In the successful implementation of the smart village approach, special attention should be paid to the village's socio-economic innovations and expertise, the needs of residents and the local economy, access to innovation resources, as well as management methods and skills. Considering the above, any trade-off in the implementation of the smart village is unacceptable, and the roads to smart development should be paved as quickly as possible to achieve rural development. Of course, in this way, while paying attention to internal and external potentials, first (given that the most inhibiting factor is related to infrastructure factors) the smart infrastructure should be implemented. By establishing the right infrastructure, building a culture, solving rural economic problems, changing the government's attitude towards villages (looking at villages as an investment, not a cost), and of course, under the shadow of proper management, smart development can be implemented not only in the villages of Meshginshahr but also in the villages of the entire country, and in this way, help the country achieve national development.