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Showing 9 results for Sustainable Development

Abdullah Abdullahi, Mohammad Velaee, Arezoo Anvari,
Volume 2, Issue 6 (3-2014)
Abstract

Poverty as a socio-economic issue has unsuitable out ones in rural societies. It is said to be an abstract in the way to rural sustainable development. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effects of social capital on rural poverty reduction in rural areas of Ghobchagh village in Miyandoab County. The method of this research is analytical-description. Data collection has performed through documentation and field survey. In doing data analysis, descriptive situational measures (mean, variance, standard deviation) inferential statistics (Spearman correlation analysis, multiple regression analysis and path analysis) has been used. Study area is Ghobchagh village in Miyandoab County with 163 sample of household in Cochran’s modified formula. Results shows, a meaning full relationship between rise of social capital elements and reduction of economic poverty of villages. In such a way that all the elements of social capital (trust, participation, unity and social communication) has negative effect on economic poverty reduction of villages. In this between, social unity’s elements value of with 0.598 has the highest effect and trust element (factor) with a value of 0.197 has the lowest effect on reduction in economic poverty in the study area.

Mohammad Vallaee, Behruz Mohammadi Yeganeh,
Volume 3, Issue 8 (8-2014)
Abstract

The more varied the system is, the more dynamic and sustainable would by both in time and space. This in turn, would maintain both internal and external tensions. Variation regarding rural economy is being considered as one of the approaches for achievement of sustainable rural development. The major objective of this study is to investigate the relationship between variation in rural economy and the degree of its sustainability approach. The nature of this study represents applicability. The research method is based on descriptive-analytical. It further demands field works and documentation. The study area is northern Marhamat Abad in Miandoab. The sample size based on modified Cochran was 264 extracted from 2800 households. It further utilized both descriptive as well as in feral statistic that is clustering spearman regression coefficient and VIKOR model. This study suggests that there exist a significant variation between variation of rural economy and the degree of their sustainability at 0.05 significant level. That is greater the variation in rural economy, the greater would be the degree of rural sustainability.

Hossein Farahani, Zakia Rasouli Nia, Zahra Asdqy Sraskanrvd,
Volume 3, Issue 9 (11-2014)
Abstract

Introduction:
Nowadays, low job offers, unemployment and rural poverty are being considered as a major driving force for rural- urban migration. This in turn may cause some problems both for rural and urban communities as well as some challenges with respect toachievement of sustainable rural communities.  Taking into account these challenges, entrepreneurs through their creative economic efforts could be helpful regarding economic improvement of rural areas. Even though the major motive behind this sort of activities is private benefit but they could provide proper atmosphere for entrepreneurial ship at local, regional and national level. Rural communities taking into account their physical, social and economic situations simultaneously could offer both opportunity and weakness regarding entrepreneurial ship. It is argued that the development of entrepreneurial activities in rural areas must be based on rural capabilities in order to be successful and head toward sustainability. Jaber Ansar district located in central part of Abdanan, taking into account its prominent characteristics including proximity to urban areas, possession of active handicraft, the existence of fertile agricultural lands and natural resource abundance, possess high entrepreneurial potentials at local and regionalnevel. The major objective of this study is to investigate sustainable rural development potential from entrepreneurial ship and employment aspect in the study area.
Methodology:
The type of study of this study is explorative. It is based on descriptive- analytical research method. It is further supported by documentation and field works including questionnaire, interviews and observation. The study area is Jaber Ansar district located in Abdanan. Statistical society is composed of head of households were selected through application of Cochran formula and random sampling technique. The questionnaires were composed of four components and 32 indicators related to entrepreneurial development and rural employment. The data analysis further demands application of descriptive statistics and principal component analysis and SPSS.
Conclusion:
According to principle component analysis results in the study area, eight factors including infra-structure, economic, awareness, self-confidence, personal creativity,innovative capabilities, physical infra structures and access to different facilities have prominent impacts upon sustainable development from entrepreneur aspects. These factors are capable of explaining 75.25% of the variation. Infra structural and social factor with eigenvalue of 5.63% is the major factor and is capable of explaining 17.60% of the variation. This is followed by economic factor as the second major one with the eigenvalue of 4.48%. It is capable of explaining 14.01 % of the variation. The least important factor is access to economic. Facilities eigenvalue is % 44 and capable of explaining 4.51% of the variation. It may be concluded that the improvement of appropriate public infra–structures including provision of drinking water, electricity and fuel, proper communications as well as transportation facilities, post banks, well designed and equipped transportation systems for shipping commodities to markets, access to skilled and literate labor force are all being considered as influential factors for provision of needed potentials and pave the way for entrepreneurship. It is argued that economic development in rural areas requires new strategies. This in turn is associated with entrepreneurship and environmental policies. Thus economically speaking entrepreneur plans in the study areas would be fairly effective needed for creation of occupation, special credit facilities sufficient funds for small businesses, awarding low interest rate and non-paying back loans especially in deprived areas are among some of the recommended measures.

Eisa Pourramzan, Zahra Akbari,
Volume 3, Issue 10 (3-2015)
Abstract

Introduction
The industrialization of rural areas has led to changes in rural economies through the absorption of rural population. This in turn, helps in reduction in unemployment rate as well as economic growth. This strategy is capable of improving rural standard of living and paves the way for the achievement of sustainable rural economy. This study tries to investigate the dimensions, aspects and benefits associated with linkages between agriculture and rural industries in general and in central part of Rasht in particular. It further stresses on the impact of agricultural complementary processing industries upon rural economy.
Methodology
This study has applied nature and it is based on descriptive - analytical method. It further demands application of survey, field works as well as documentation. Statistical society composed of rural development experts. Out of 243 first round questionnaires, 48 were selected. The credibility of this questionnaire was done using the related experts. Its viability was determined to be 0.876 using Kronbakh alpha. This study further supports application of SPSS, Excel and Arc GIS for data analysis purpose.
Conclusion
This study suggests that the benefits and impacts of linkages between agriculture and industries are proven. This could exemplify itself in agricultural product support at different production stages, usage of new agricultural economic method, strengthening rural economy base, creation of jobs incomes as well as expansion of exports and rural investments. This linkage in turn could lead to strengthening rural economy bases and the achievement of rural sustainable development. It finally conveys this message that the only way of increase in agricultural products and self- sufficiency and entering into international market competition is through creation of agricultural complementary – processing industries.

Majid Yasouri, Farhad Javan,
Volume 4, Issue 13 (11-2015)
Abstract

Introduction
In economy structure of rural districts in different countries, agriculture is considered as the main source of livelihood. The most important characteristic of this structure is lack of diversification for economic contexts and job opportunities, especially for the increasing number of people in the villages which is almost the result of attitude toward the village and government policies and internal factors in the village. The consequences that are the results of dependency of the users to the environment out of the village and external markets, obvious and unobvious unemployment, decrease in return of investment, destruction of basic natural resources, rural economy vulnerability, and instability of income sources include weakening economy and culture of the village, rural migration and marginalization. The country's villages have a weak economy and they are vulnerable because of their severe dependency on agriculture and its income and lack of employment sources and non-farm income sources. Agriculture section is not capable of increasing the level of income because of limitation of land areas which cannot be increased. Therefore, it seems necessary to search for another income source regarding the capabilities and limitation of each region of the country for rural economy diversification in order to increase the population stability in the villages. Upper Ashkevar rural district is located in a mountain region and therefore it has limitation in land area, it has agriculture -based livelihood, a limited capacity for employing workforce and no diversification. Because of population growth and increase of the number of young workforce, unemployment rate is growing every day and it seems to be extremely important to find alternative strategies for villagers' employment and income earning in this region focusing on population stability and saving the remained population. Therefore, diversification approach for rural economic activities as a useful strategy is one of the most important strategies which is presented for reducing the negative impacts of unsustainability in different environmental, economic and social aspects on rural contexts and in accordance with sustainable development pattern which is confirmed by most of international organizations including Global Bank and by most of theorists. High vulnerability of agriculture activities in the region has increased the necessity of diversification in agriculture activities. This study aims to answer the following question: "What are the most important limitations in diversification of rural economic activities in Upper Ashkevar"?
Methodology
This survey is a practical one, regarding its aim and it is done by descriptive-analytic method. The population includes villages of Ashkurat district in Rudsar which is determined according to field studies in the region and exploratory studies. For assessment of studied variables, we used survey methods and documentary research methods to obtain the information needed. In documentary part, we collected data by reviewing the literature and theories and in quantitative part we analyzed data which were collected through field study and also by the information provided from some organizations. The study population includes villages of Upper Ashkevar rural district (53 villages) in Rudsar County. To determine the number of households, we used Cochran Formula and according to that, samples are 285 households. Alfa Cronbach coefficient is calculated 0.786. To analysis the impacts of infrastructural and basic variables, natural factors and social factors which are effective on the lack of diversification in rural economy activities, we used step by step multi regression analysis method. The studied region is located in Rahimabad district in Rudsar County, north of Iran. Its elevation is 1500 to 2000 meter above sea level. Its population has decreased from 2478 people in 2006 to 1619 people in 2011. Agriculture is the basic occupation for the villagers in this region. Environmental limitation especially droughts in recent decades and climate changes in most years have threatened the agriculture production in this area.
Discussion and Conclusion
One of the most effective factors to describe the presence of increasing unemployment, low income, migration from rural districts to cities, low level of production, and inefficient use of resources is lack of diversification in economic activities in rural settlements. This issue has a fundamental role in economic instability. Rural settlements in this region are affected by many factors including unevenness of the soil surface, weather, water resources, soil and vegetation, limitation of slope, cold weather, geographical isolation and lack of infrastructures. As a result, there is a sever instability in economy and population of this region; in a way that during two censuses in 85 and 90, population of this region decreased by 30%. Increase of unemployment, poverty, income inequality and as a consequence pressure on basic resources have resulted in environmental problems including soil erosion. The obtained results show that among all the different factors which were studied, the impact of infrastructural and basic factors is more than other variables. Then, environmental factors, economic factors and social factors are effective in lack of rural economy diversification respectively. Regarding this, providing and implementing development plans for expansion and improvement of infrastructure levels such as suitable road, supporting services for production and alternant industries can be effective in rural economy diversification of the region.
 

Manijeh Ahmadi,
Volume 10, Issue 35 (4-2021)
Abstract

 
Introduction
The poor management of water demand in Iran has led to increasing demand for this vital source and wasting great amount of this material. Therefore, water resources management has been declared as the most important socio-economic subject, and it is vital to find useful solutions in order to manage this resource sustainably. In this path, despite the location of Ghani Beiglou Rural District near the water-rich-river called Mirjan, the water balance of this area had been violated due to over use and lack of rainfall in the way that some of the villages in this area had no choice unless to get water access rationed. On the other hand, the life of almost 80 percent of villagers depends on agriculture, which is no longer possible due to lack of water. Therefore, shortage in water resources in this territory had caused vital problems such as not using water consumption sufficient policies in the time of crisis, no support of new suitable irrigation methods from the government, decrease in agriproducts efficiency, decrease in employment, investment and income of the agriculture sector. Finally, identifying the factors and solutions in water resource management could be an effective step for improving the water resource management in agricultural sector in this region. Therefore, purpose of present study is to analyze and assess rural sustainable water management in Ghani Beiglou Rural District. 
 
Reseach Methods
This study has applied purpose, and it is descriptive-analytical in nature. Data have been gathered by library and field methods. Statistical population is rural farmer families in Ghani Beiglou villages in Zanjan District. According to 2013 agricultural survey, this district has 2054 farmer households, and the area of cultivated land is 21892 hectares. This rural district has 32 villages in its territory. We found out that among these 32 villages the water resource management projects had been designed for and applied on just five villages including Ebrahim Abad, Mirjan, Mehrabad, Andabad Olia and Andabad Sofla. So these five villages are this study’s sample. This village have 631 farmers according to 2013 agricultural census. Among them we chose 160 individuals for analysis using Cochran sampling formula. Simple accidental sampling was used in each village, and in order to analyze the descriptive-inferential data of questionnaires, we used descriptive-inferential methods.   
 
Discussion and Conclusion
The results of water resource management show that Mehrabad Village with score of 90.44 is in better situation, also in rural sustainable development, and economic aspect compare to four other villages. Andabad Olia Village is in the better condition with numerical average of 123.9, for social aspect Mirjan Village with numerical average of 108.84, for livability dimension Andbad Sofla Village with numerical average of 87.6, and for physical aspect Andabad Sofla Village have better situation compare to others. Moreover, results show that there is a significant relationship between sufficient water resource management and sustainable development of rural areas in significant level of 0.01 and the correlation rate of 0.315. Besides all these, water resource management has impact on rural sustainable development by the level of 0.271. For aspect of the amount of BETA, highest impact is for the index of knowledge and awareness with the amount of 0.522 and the institutional index of 0.036 has the second highest effect on rural development.
The recent droughts and water shortages in the region and its negative impacts on agriculture led to consequences such as decreasing in income, employment rate, investment and increasing in unemployment and job elimination and migration rate to cities. People of some of these villages had acted to sufficiently mange the water resource based on their limited and unreflecting knowledge about modern irrigation methods, on their own and/or in few cases with getting help from the government and Agricultural-Jahad Organization, even though their help is not even close to enough. As a result, Mehrabad Village is a case that is more successful than other villages in developing the sufficient water management with numerical average of 90.44 due to more individual involvement of villagers. Also, this improvement in applying such project had positive impacts on rural sustainable development and agriculture. Marjan Village for aspect of level of rural sustainable development in different economic, social, environmental and Physical dimensions is at a better situation than other villages with numeric average of 0.96. Furthermore, its been found that there is a positive relationship between sufficient water resource management, rural sustainable development and agriculture sector in this region has a vital role in providing required food, producing raw material for industry, employment and creating income. Therefore, in order to reach a more and well managed agriculture development and take steps towards rural sustainable development, this region needs to use water resources sufficiently. Finally results show that each one of the water resource management indexes has different impact on the rural sustainable development, and among them the highest impact is for the index of knowledge and awareness with Beta amount of 0.522.

Mahdiyeh Saei, Pirooz Shakeri, Asghar Salehi, Sefatolah Rahmani,
Volume 10, Issue 37 (12-2021)
Abstract

Introduction
Providing qualified, healthy and enough food for the population of the country has always been a fundamental issue for government officials and experts. At the same time, the economic growth of the society, the raise of consumption of livestock products in the household and the growth of the population have increased the demand for these products. Given these, conducting new scientific research for sustainable development of animal husbandry and promotion of livestock production is one of the inevitable strategies. Kerman Province has a dry/arid climate, but due to its large rangelands, it is one of the traditional nomadic places for rural livestock activities in the country. Because of unbalanced distribution, some areas of Kerman Province have a good ability to produce livestock, especially in rural and nomadic areas, which has a large share in supplying meat and dairy products needed for local people and even exported to neighboring places.  At present, the north of Kerman province is ranked the 13th red meat, egg and honey producer, the 17th milk producer and the 18th chicken meat producer. The amount of animal husbandry employment in this province is 40%. A small amount of studies in Iran investigated structural and institutional factors influencing the sustainable development of the livestock industry. This is a common issue for other countries too.  Studies have been mostly on the factors on sustainable development of other sectors such as tourism, sustainable rural development, etc.

Methodology
According to the purpose, nature and method, this study is considered as an applied and descriptive-analytical research, respectively. The statistical population consisted of three groups: experts of the deputy for livestock in Agricultural Jahad Organization of Kerman Province, experts of the Animal Sciences Research Department of the Kerman Agricultural Research Center, and some representatives of private sector organizations. 20 individuals were selecetd from these groups.  The data collection tool was a questionnaire including 70 close questions. This questionnaire was divided in 7 domains (indicators): vision, objectives and macro strategies in policy (4 items), process and cycles of input supply and sales of livestock products (4 items), vision, objective and strategies for sustainable development of livestock industry (12 items), upgrading the capacity of existing economic activities in the livestock industry (18 items), sustainable development programs in the livestock industry (10 items), effective mechanisms in sustainable development of the livestock industry (13 items), social and institutional  requirements for implementation of development projects (7 items). 

Discussion and conclusion
The results of the study obtained using descriptive and inferential statistics showed that for the vision, objectives and macro strategies in policy for Kerman Province in the official documents (before the Sixth National Development Plan and after two-year implementation of the Plan), the most successful livestock was first the heavy livestock and then the poultry. Light livestock and aquatic animals are the next prospering livestock before the Sixth National Development Plan. However, the performance of the two-year implementation of the Sixth Plan has been less successful than the previous plans, so this need to be addressed in planning and policy making. Regarding the process and cycles of input supply and sales of livestock products, experts believe that supplying the inputs (fodder and concentrate, chickens, genes, vaccines, medicine, etc.) before production, and then services and supply during production, such as veterinary and health services, technical guidance to production units are the most effective measures. On the other hand, marketing procedure and products supply to the final consumer as well as the collection, processing and processing of livestock products are less important. Therefore, the problems of providing inputs and fodder and services should be a priority for the relevant organizations. One of the most effective indicators of sustainable development of the livestock industry in the north of Kerman Province is the income enhancement. Consequently, any policy for sustainable development of the livestock industry should first increase the income for the ranchers. The experts also believe that the facilitation of the Agriculture Jahad Organization is the most effective action for enhancing the capacity of economic activities in the livestock industry. The facilitator enables the group or organization to operate more effectively, increase collaboration, and create cooperation. The facilitator also encourages individuals to participate, understand each other, and collectively do tasks. Among the current programs for sustainable development of the livestock industry in the north of Kerman Province, increasing production and productivity is of the highest importance from the experts' point of view. Improving the entrepreneurial attitude and identifying human resources in the livestock industry to implement projects are the other variables that can pave the way for improving and promoting the sustainable development of the rural livestock industry in the north of Kerman Province.

Akram Ghanbari, Abdul Reza Rahmani Fazli, Farhad Azizpour,
Volume 11, Issue 39 (5-2022)
Abstract

Introduction
Today, in order to achieve sustainable rural development as well as optimization of local advantages, identifying the factors affecting the utilization of geographical advantages are essential. The villages of the country today are more than ever influenced by the political, economic, social and cultural conditions of their systems as external factors influencing the development of rural settlements. These are factors such as inappropriate government policies at all levels of planning, legislation, management and implementation, bias towards urban areas and large industries, lack of independent civil society organizations, fostering the transformation of villages into cities and so on. Moreover, the internal obstacles of rural communities are such as: low level of awareness of rural stakeholders on their internal and socio-economic capacities, restrictive norms, low power of transformation, and low the power of risk, overcoming traditional approaches to harnessing the potential of rural areas, and the uncertainty and trust between rural communities towards new perspectives and patterns, etc. Both factors are the reasons for neglecting rural areas and lack of  proper operation of the capacity and potential in this area. Rural settlements in Khorramabad county have not seen much growth and are facing instability of rural settlements, despite their high potentials and capacities in the agricultural and non-agricultural sectors. In this regard, the present study seeks to answer the following question: What are the factors influencing the role of geographical advantages in achieving sustainable development of rural settlements?

 Methodology
The purpose of this study was to identify the factors affecting the role of geographical advantages in achieving sustainable development in rural settlements of Khorramabad. In this regard, it is a combination (quantitative-qualitative) research method with sequential strategy and exploratory - descriptive research design. Based on this orientation and evaluation, the Q model was selected for problem recognition and analysis. The statistical population of the study is the villages of Khorramabad. The qualitative participants were expert villagers who selected 30 theoretically saturated subjects and data were collected using semi-structured interviews and semi-structured interview card tools. In the quantitative section, we chose village experts. 150 villages out of 647 villages, were selected by simple stratified sampling. Next, one rural mayor or council was selected from each village. In the Q model, Q cards were used to collect data.

Discussion and conclusion
According to rural experts, the lack of role of geographical advantages in the feasibility of sustainable rural development in the study areas is influenced by the following factors: low level of skill and familiarity with modern knowledge, dominance of conservative mindset, lack of creativity and innovation, aging population, dominance of closed cultural beliefs, low income, inflation and uneven distribution of credit resources, market system instability, poor attention to infrastructure and welfare services, rural education and promotion system failure, weak legal-institutional arrangements, lack of system Integrated program for agricultural activities commensurate with domestic and foreign markets, service weakness Production support, low level of security and weakness of processing companies.
Rural experts' perceptions of the inability of geographical advantages to achieve sustainable rural development fall into five categories: economic factors, managerial-institutional factors, socio-cultural factors, human factors, and physical factors, which are economic factors with  25%, managerial-institutional factors with 23.66%, socio-cultural factors with 23.66%, human factors with 20.23% and physical factors with 8.70% had the most influence on the lack of role of geographical advantages in the feasibility of sustainable rural development.
According to the results, meticulous planning in organizing economic, social, political, organizational and managerial and cultural constructions, utilizing the geographical advantages of rural areas is one of the most important prerequisites for achieving sustainable rural development. As a result, planners need to identify and analyze the forces and relationships that make the most of these advantages by influencing shaping forces and processes, help improve the conditions in the geographic advantage process.

 

Mostafa Mardani Najafabadi, Yasamin Zebari, Nasrin Ohadi,
Volume 11, Issue 41 (12-2022)
Abstract

Introduction
Population growth, the need to provide food security, and pressure on natural resources in developing countries are facing a fundamental challenge for the sustainable production of food products. The need to pay attention to sustainability in agriculture has been confirmed at local, regional, national, and global levels. Sustainable agriculture is a system that uses resources efficiently, produces healthy food resources, preserves the quality of the environment and resources for future generations, and is economically dynamic. Sustainability is a qualitative concept that cannot be measured directly, so appropriate indicators should be selected to determine the amount and durability of an agricultural system. Efficiency is a significant factor in the productivity growth of production resources, especially in developing countries. Increasing efficiency can be considered a suitable and sustainable complement to a set of policies that encourage and protect domestic production and promote the optimal use of resources. The exact definition of efficiency can be found in Pareto's definition. According to the definition of efficiency, a system has Pareto efficiency so that it is impossible to improve the economic status of an individual from society without worsening the economic status of another individual. In other words, the reallocation of resources should not worsen the situation of some people in society. Therefore, improving the efficiency and optimal consumption of production factors in improving the sustainability of agricultural operations in the direction of sustainable development is inevitable. Based on this, the main goal of the present study is to determine the efficiency and optimal use of production resources by rice farmers in rural areas of Gotvand in the direction of sustainable development under conditions of uncertainty (the application of robust Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)).

Methodology
Efficiency measurement methods are classified into two parametric and non-parametric methods according to their characteristics. The most apparent model proposed in the non-parametric framework is the DEA model. In DEA, the efficiency of a group of investigated units is determined by using a multiple set of input and output variables. One of the major limitations of the mentioned method is the high sensitivity of this method to the change in the value of input and output data, or in other words, the presence of uncertainty in these data. Because agriculture is always faced with uncertainty, when the input and output values ​​have uncertainty, the mentioned model faces problems. In this regard, it is necessary to use another method that can protect optimal solutions against uncertainty. Recently, various methods have been proposed to overcome the problem of uncertain data in DEA, such as Interval DEA (IDEA), Fuzzy DEA (FDEA) and Stochastic DEA (SDEA). Another method of dealing with uncertain data that was introduced in mathematical programming models in the late 1990s is Robust DEA (RDEA). This method does not have some shortcomings in other methods for applying uncertainty conditions in the DEA model. The RDEA is one of the robust and valuable models in conditions of uncertainty, and in this study, this method was used to analyze the efficiency of rice farmers. The required data in the study area was obtained through the distribution and completion of the questionnaire in 2018 by 121 rice farmers considering the statistical population and using simple random sampling.

Discussion and conclusion
The average technical efficiency in the state of constant return to scale efficiency and at the level of 0.5 deviation probability and 20% uncertainty level is equal to 0.79, which means that rice farmers can use a fixed technology without reducing production, reduce their input consumption by 21% and reach the production efficiency bound. As a result, the producers of the studied area need to use production inputs optimally to produce a given level of production. However, the actual values ​​of input consumption by rice farmers in rural areas are far from the estimated optimal values. In other words, there is excess consumption for all inputs. The most inefficient inputs in the present study are the area under cultivation and herbicide. Therefore, achieving the optimal level of consumption of these inputs without reducing production by reducing 48% and 45% in the consumption of the cultivated area and herbicide, respectively. Considering the low technical efficiency and unfavorable input consumption among the rice farmers in the researched rural areas, it is suggested to identify efficient units and serve as a reference for inefficient units and develop a regular annual plan for optimal input consumption by farmers and as a result of improving efficiency, to improve the sustainability of agricultural operations in line with the goals of sustainable development. Also, educational planning is recommended to use suitable and advanced technologies to increase the productivity of production factors.

 


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