Participation of local ranchers for developing livestock drinking water resources has been identified as inadequate in Yazd Province located in the central part of Iran. Thorough understanding of barriers among various factors influencing the public participation is complex. In this study, to evaluate and prioritize the influencing criteria and parameters, ANP was used in which relationships are considered in form of non-linear. The information required in this study were collected using tools of questionnaire and expert knowledge elicitation. The results show a combined effect of various criteria on level of participation with different relative weights. Economic criterion in this study with normal weight of 0.455 represents 1.5 times more importance compared with climatic criterion and 2 times more importance in comparison to social criterion. Analysis indicates that following parameter of “Low income of animal husbandry” with normal weight of 0.319, as the most important influencing economic factor, climatic parameter of “Recurrent droughts and reduced rainfall” with normal weight of 0.153, and social parameter of “Poor role of NGOs” with normal weight of 0.093, respectively represent the most important parameters in the context of this study. ANP model facilitates assessment and provides more detailed information for the decision makers.

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