Strategies for Ensuring Water Security in Rural Communities of Ilam Province

A B S T R A C T
The dependence of rural communities, and especially the agricultural sector, on water resources is undeniable. During the last few decades, water shortages have caused more attention to the optimal management of these resources. Water security includes the capacity of the population to protect and maintain sustainable access to sufficient quantities and quality of water for sustainable livelihoods, human well-being, and socio-economic development. This research aims to develop strategies for ensuring water security in rural communities of Ilam province. This research has used the prospective approach. At first, semi-structured interviews were conducted, which were analyzed by content analysis. The sample size in the final report was 17 experts, university professors, and farmers. The results of this part were returned to the respondents for a questionnaire. This research showed that the realization of water security in the studied area requires attention to the areas that have the most significant ability to influence other components. In this way, "determining the trustee of rural development, making policies for crisis management in the village, monitoring and checking the amount of water consumption in farms/installation of digital meters, changing the water price according to the type of cultivation, forming water harvesting associations and developing a new irrigation system" among other things can cover the target
Extended Abstract
Introduction
As one of the smallest provinces in the country, Ilam province is not immune from the water shortage crisis. Per capita water consumption in Ilam province is four times the world's average, and the amount of precipitation is about half of the average. The share of water use in Ilam province in agriculture, industry, and drinking water sectors is 78, 16, and 6 %, respectively, which has caused many problems in the villages due to the lack of scientific use of water in the agriculture sector and the drought crisis. Therefore, according to the necessity of the issue and what was mentioned about the importance of water and its insecurity in the country, the spread and expansion of this phenomenon in the coming years is not expected, and the need to pay serious attention to it is felt. Thus, research focused on future forecasting of the water insecurity problem and strategy formulation can be considered a desirable solution, and the present research was carried out on this basis.
 
Methodology
The present research is descriptive and survey research. The sample size was 17 experts, university professors, and farmers who were selected by the purposeful snowball sampling method. This research consists of two stages. The first part was done with a qualitative approach, and the second part was done with a quantitative approach, which is described below.
1-Qualitative part: Content analysis was used to analyze the interviews in the qualitative part of the research. This research raised an open question: "In your opinion, what are the most important effective solutions in managing water resources?" Moreover, each respondent was asked to write down their opinion briefly and anonymously.
2- Quantitative part: In this research, the key drivers in the study area were identified by applying the "Drivers Analysis" technique. The information and data needed in this step were obtained by questionnaire/matrix of cross effects. First, all the components finalized in the previous stage were designed in the form of a "cross-effects" matrix and were returned to the interviewees in the previous step, and they were asked to score.  After collecting the questionnaires, the resulting data were analyzed, and Micmac software was used in this section.
 
Results and discussion
The descriptive results related to the gender variable showed that the highest frequency was assigned to the female gender (21 people), and the lowest number belonged to men with a frequency of 16 people. Also, other results showed that the highest frequency was assigned to the master's degree (14 people); the next rank was the bachelor's degree, which had 2 frequencies. The number of people who had a doctorate included one person. On the other hand, the descriptive results related to the respondents' place of service show that most respondents are from the selected institutions directly and indirectly related to the subject. To reach the goal of the research, the collected interviews were analyzed using content analysis. The initial results were 76 codes, and after the analysis, it was tried to re-examine the open codes. In the continuation of this process and after categorizing the codes, duplicate and similar items were removed, and 49 solutions were finalized. In the final step, the codes were combined and summarized based on the following criteria, and as a result, 19 components were finalized. Finally, based on the respondents' opinion, the mentioned components can be effective in managing dehydration in the future. In this part, only the components were identified, and the prioritization or degree of importance of none of the mentioned items has not been specified. In this step, all the components obtained in the previous step were converted into a questionnaire and returned to the respondents, who were asked to give points. The results of this part show that there are six solutions other than drivers, which are:
-Determining the custodian of rural development,
-Making policies for crisis management in the village,
-Monitoring and checking the amount of water consumption in farms/installing a digital meter,
- Changing the water price according to the type of cultivation,
-Forming water catchment associations
-And developing a new irrigation system".
 Water security proves the government can provide sufficient and safe water to meet social, economic, and environmental sustainability needs. Water security is the availability of safe and reliable access to sufficient amounts of water to maintain livelihoods, people's well-being, socio-economic development, protection against pollution and disasters caused by water, and maintaining the ecosystem in an environment full of peace and political stability.
 
Conclusion
In this research, key drivers were identified in the study area. According to the results obtained in the previous stages, strategies should be formulated, and the content should follow the eight strategies that can cover the mentioned areas well. The results of this research showed that, without a doubt, the water crisis has not had a proper place in the country's policymaking. This has caused a lack of specific and comprehensive planning to face the crisis. Also, the existing programs have not reached a proper conclusion due to the partiality and lack of coordination of the institutions and organizations in charge of water affairs. Also, to reduce the existing problems, using the water market approach has received more and more attention at the national and international levels in recent years. The legal issues of water trade are among the most important things that should be considered in forming and developing water markets.
In addition, in order to maintain the sustainability of the production of products in addition to the limited water resources, proper management of the available resources is needed. Therefore, the production of agricultural products will be stabilized by creating an optimal cultivation model while using the capacities of water, soil, and climate in principle. Water pricing for demand management; the economic valuation of water has an important and decisive role in efficiently allocating water resources, adopting appropriate policies, and making effective decisions. Finally, irrigation technology and agricultural water management can be cable irrigation, pressure irrigation methods (rain and drip), irrigation fertilizer, wave irrigation, low irrigation, use of wastewater in agriculture, cultivation of drought-resistant cultivars, and establishment of stations.
 
Funding
There is no funding support.
 
Authors’ Contribution
First author: Drafting the principles; Second author: Data collection; Third author: Data analysis; Fourth author: Translation and final editing of the article and extended abstract.
 
Conflict of Interest
Authors declared no conflict of interest.
 
Acknowledgments
We are grateful to all the scientific consultants of this paper.