Analyzing Silk Hand Woven Carpet Production Methods in the Rural Communities of the Zanjan County

Extended abstract ۱. INTRODUCTION Handmade carpet has an important contribution to Iran's export, employment, art and rural households' livelihoods producing it, but it faces the challenges of quality and efficiency improvement in different production methods. The handmade carpet industry provides considerable job opportunities for rural households involving in carpet weaving and other relevant activists in this industry value chain. An effective carpet production value chain for supplying carpet to local and international markets depends on increased quality and efficiency of handmade carpet production, which is influenced by many factors including production methods, inputs, and functional and structural factors in handmade carpet production. The production method or system can affect the amount of production, productivity, input access and quality, the allocation of resources, production competitiveness in markets, production quality and marketing margin, which have socio-economic impacts on rural communities. ۲. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK Literature shows three different handmade carpet production systems or methods in Iran, namely, self-production system, entrepreneurial based production system, and participatory or cooperative based production system. A self-production system includes a small-scale individual or family based production enterprise, which is managed by a rural or an urban carpet weaver. An entrepreneurial based production system is managed by a public or a private entrepreneur, who provides inputs to carpet weavers or contract producers, and collects produced carpets to sell in the markets. In a participatory or cooperative based production system, a number of carpet weavers make decision collectively and work together in different production stages, including providing required inputs, producing handmade carpets, and supplying carpets to markets. This study was conducted to investigate silk hand woven carpet production methods in rural areas of Zanjan province. It also seeks to explain the differences of these methods in terms of input access, production relations, and marketing. ۳. METHODOLOGY The study is recognized as an exploratory and explanatory qualitative research, which utilizes a mixed methodology of case study and survey. The data were collected using both qualitative and quantitative techniques. In addition to participatory and direct observations, focus groups and semi-structured interviews were organized with ۹۰ rural households and carpet market actors (i.e., qualitative data). Moreover, in the survey, quantitative data were collected using structured interviews with ۲۶۵ rural households in ۲۳ rural communities, which were randomly selected from silk carpet weaving households in the rural communities of Zanjan County in Zanjan province, Iran. The qualitative perspective of the research employed the Grounded Theory technique to explore concepts, make categories and hypotheses and explain relations between phenomena as a theory. The initial research was conducted in two villages as an exploratory study, which led to coding, making concepts and categories, identifying relations between categories and defining hypotheses. Then, a theory based sampling technique was utilized and the second stage of data collection was governed in ۲۳ villages. Based on the theoretical saturation principle, the results led to the saturation of categories, testing the emerging hypotheses and finally the specification of substantive theory. The quantitative data were also analyzed using the SPSS Software utilizing descriptive analyses. ۴. DISCUSSION The rural carpet weavers produced their silk carpets through two methods in ۲۳ rural communities, namely, the entrepreneurial based production and the self-production methods. No collective or participatory production method was identified in the study. Most carpet weavers were rural women, though men contributed to input access and marketing. In the entrepreneurial based production method, the rural weavers produced carpets through either receiving wage for carpet weaving (i.e., wage-based production) or sharing the costs and benefits earned between the entrepreneur and the carpet weaver (i.e., sharing production). On the other hand, in the self-production method, the rural households provided their own required inputs and their products through getting access to urban markets inside or outside the province. The quality of carpet key inputs, such as silk, map and design in the entrepreneurial based production was higher than in the self-production method and the produced carpets had higher market demand and prices, but the less value added amount was given to the carpet weavers. The high benefit of the entrepreneur in the entrepreneurial wage-based production was due to high assets and access to information, financial resources and inputs. They had access to wide communication and network channels to know market and input qualities; moreover, they had sufficient financial resources to purchase high quality inputs, suitable for producing silk carpets with national and international customer and market demand, and to invest more on carpet production. ۵– CONCLUSION The hypothesis of superiority of the entrepreneurial wage-based production over other production methods is not confirmed, because if self-producing rural carpet weavers get and have access to required information, finance and inputs, and have influence in market network through their community based organizations, they can reduce the market margin and enhance their value added amount in handmade silk carpet value chain.