Exploring cultivation site of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) by utilizing GIS linked to AHP Siavash Ehsan Falahat 1 • Hashem Hadi 1 • Sina Siavash Moghaddam 1 • Ali Aryanfar 2 Received: 23 July 2018 / Revised: 25 December 2018 / Accepted: 27 December 2018 Ó Korean Spatial Information Society 2019 Abstract Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) is the most expen- sive medicinal crop in the world. This crop plays a specific role in the economy and social life of Southern and Central Khorasan provinces. Its production has been recently popularized in the northwestern regions of Iran. Accord- ingly, the present study evaluates the climatic conditions for saffron production in Western Azerbaijan Province based on a ten-year statistics of 2005–2014. To this end, 10 meteorological stations were selected across the province and were modeled and subjected to spatial analysis of data in Arc GIS Software Package. Using optimum climatic conditions for each growth stage of saffron, the data layers were classified and the weight value of each zone was specified and the final map that showed the climatic potential for saffron growing based on the analytic hier- archy process. The results showed that the role of each individual climatic variable including precipitation, tem- perature, and number of sunny hours varied with the growth stage as well as the slope map and the land use in different regions of West Azerbaijan Province. Of 37,113.4 km 2 of lands excluding Lake Urmia, 16.70% is highly limited, 70.30% is moderately limited, 11.16% is lowly limited and 1.84% is unlimited. Keywords Site selection Á Saffron Á West Azerbaijan Province Á GIS 1 Introduction Climate is one of the most important factors considered by human being throughout history because climate elements have always played a crucial role in human life, especially in agricultural production [1]. Awareness of how to adapt agricultural activities of each region with its climatic conditions is imperative for all agricultural activities. Agriculture is influenced by climatic factors more strongly than other activities. Therefore, recognizing the relation- ships between climatic variables and their impacts on crops is of high socioeconomic value for countries [2]. Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) from the lily family grows in the Mediterranean and Western Asia climates covering the latitudes of 30–50°N and the longitudes of 10°W to 80°E. In Iran, it is the dominant crop in regions with very low rainfall, warm winters, and hot summers. As the most expensive agricultural and medicinal crop in the world, saffron has a special place among Iran’s industrial and export commodities. Currently, Iran is the leading producer and exporter of saffron in the world so that it accounts for more than 95% of the global saffron production [3]. It is important to identify the capabilities of a land before loading various activities. In a study on the regression relationship between saffron stigma yield and final sustainability index, Hatami Sardashti et al. [4] showed that they were related to one another significantly (p \ 0.01). Geographic Information System (GIS) is called spatial information technology, which allows for the testing and analysis of a wider range of agricultural resources simul- taneously and accurately [5]. Given the fact that the mea- surement of land suitability at the level of the study site requires the consideration of different factors and criteria, it is imperative to apply multi-criteria decision-making & Sina Siavash Moghaddam sinamoghaddam2003@gmail.com; ss.moghaddam@urmia.ac.ir 1 Department of Agronomy, Faculty of Agriculture, Urmia University, Urmia, Iran 2 Zharf Azaran Sadr Consulting Engineers Co., Urmia, Iran 123 Spat. Inf. Res. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41324-018-00234-0