Factors that Affect the Performance of Small Industries from the Rural Development Experts\' Perspective

          Despite many advantages of rural industrialization, the present situation of rural industries in Iran can not absorb the surplus labour in rural areas, eliminate the considerable difference between the welfare in rural and urban areas, stop rural-urban migration and realize socio-economic development. An examination of factors that affect the performance of small rural industries can identify important points with respect to the reasons of the non convergence of rural small industry with rural development objectives, and delineates the main lines of inter enterprise planning (by enterprise managers) and outer enterprise policies (by government). Therefore, this paper categorized the effective factors on the performance of small rural industries into three structural, contextual and content factors. Then it used exploratory methodology to examine the experts views of rural development issues in Iran with respect to the influence of individual indicators on the performance of small rural industries and their prioritization.