Evaluating the development degree of Qazvin Province counties using the factor and cluster analysis

Abstract

Regional planning results from spatial development and economic planning in order to construct a co-ordinate and balanced construction in the regions and districts and to reduce regional imbalances by three elements of space, activity and human. Hence, it is crucial to realize the regional discrepancies and to understand their potential and weaknesses and to distinguish regional imbalances to establish a comprehensive socio-economic plan in the region. By employing quantitative methods and criteria for classification, the researcher intends to recognize, decrease and eliminate the existing inequalities .The current paper is going to specify the development degree of the counties of Qazvin province using the descriptive analysis approach. The researcher has used 48 development indices in population, infrastructure, economic-social, cultural and hygienic fields which have been extracted from statistical annals of 2011. The researcher has applied the main elements on the correlative coefficient of the data, and then employed SPSS to analyze these indices and classified them into four meaningful and significant categories which contain 100% data processing. The results show that Qazvin is the most developed county and Takestan, Bouein Zahra, Abyek and Alborz have respectively been ranked from second to fifth counties which are benefited from development factors. Then, regarding the development level, the researcher has used cluster analysis approach and classified the above mentioned counties in three equal groups. Qazvin has been the most developed and is placed in the first group, and then Takestan and Bouein Zahra have been classified in the second group (nearly developed) after that Abyek and Alborz are the least developed and have been placed in the third group for which cluster dendogram has been drawn. © 2015, Canadian Center of Science and Education.