Economic Evaluation of Shallot Utilization in Varnasa Rangeland, Naghadeh, Iran

Recognition of byproducts and their exploiting economic evaluation is one of basic requirements in documenting prospect of rangelands utilization. In this regard, the present study was performed to estimate the economic indices of exploiting byproducts production in Varnasa rangelands, Naghadeh, Iran. For this purpose, the economic data for calculating economic indices were collected after sampling vegetation and estimating shallot species byproduct and forage production per unit area in 2015. The results showed that the annual economic benefit derived from forage production per household is 71.16 US$ y-1. The generated economic rent was estimated about 98.14 US$ h-1 in year. Average gross income from the exploitation of byproducts in a harvest period per household was estimated around 838.23 US$ from 5.7 hectares that after reducing the explicit costs of utilization (transport), the net income was 761.61 US$ per household. Economic profit per household after reducing the hidden costs (labor) and explicit costs (transport) from gross income was estimated about 720.35 US$ y-1and economic rent of exploiting shallot byproducts is 473.47 US$ h-1 per year. Considering the discount rate of 3%, the expected value per hectare of the studied rangelands for the byproducts and forge production are estimated about 789.12 and 32.71 US$, respectively. Similarly, the expected total value of rangelands for byproducts and forage production is amounting totally to 821.84 US$ that the share of shallot byproduct to total rangeland expected value is 96%. Incomes from the exploiting of byproducts and forage production comprise 27.2 and 1.3% out of the average annual income of households, respectively. In addition, annual employment of shallots byproduct and forage production utilization was estimated 1.44 and 0.16 person’s y-1, respectively which the share of byproduct is about 10% out of the total employment. The results show that the byproducts exploitation plays an important role in the local economy and employment as well as declining the increase of grazing intensity. Overall, the results of this study reveal the need to consider the byproduct incomes in range management schemes and comprehensive management of natural areas