Structure of Agriculture and Methods of Cultivation on Iranian Farms of Different Size

In this paper, based on the results of several agricultural censuses and surveys, some major aspects of the structure of Iranian agriculture during the past three decades is described. Empirical evidence clearly shows that a large portion of population lives on farms and is employed in agricultural sector. While in early 60’s, share-cropping was the main form of land tenure it has been mainly transformed into owner-operated. Average farm size during the past three decades, due to the nature of land reforms and population pressure has decreased to some extent and in 1988 has been 5.78 hectares. Land distribution was highly unequal with a large differential in population/land ratio, share of land ploughed by tractor, share of fallow land, type of management, use of chemical fertiliser, and wheat yields on farms of different sizes, with the resulting inefficiencies from social point of view. The purpose of this paper is to detail the structure of agriculture and methods of cultivation on Iranian farms of different size. First, some main aspects of Iranian agriculture is described. In the second part of the paper, methods of cultivation on farms of different size is explained. Then a limited empirical evidence is presented, and finally the whole argument is summarised.