Factors Influencing the Adoption of Location Based Identification in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq

Location Based Identification (LBI) can be defined as a string of numeric or alphanumeric characters that are used to define a specific location. Virtually, it is the most compact data element capable of specifying the location of a mail addressee with high precision (Raper, Rhind, & Shepherd, 1992; Zandbergen, 2008). LBI is an essential element of communication between people, public, governmental organisations and business sectors. It plays a significant role in postal services and consequently it is a significant element of social communication and economic development. LBI is a significantly important concept that has been implemented in developed countries. Examples include the American zip code and the UK postcode. LBI is used by governments, organisations, institutions and retailers to keep track of their customers and participants. Today, as a result of continuous development and expansion, LBI needs to be devised to include a more robust sense of adaptation for the growing urban sprawl.

The lack of use of LBI in developing countries is the key point of this research. However, an issue surrounding the designed LBI systems in developed countries is the non-existence of justified design techniques. Hence, the designed LBI systems around the world lack intelligent features such as directional impressions of the codes. In this regard, this study presents a new technique to design LBI systems, where the codes give a view of how far a point is from the centre, in addition to the direction with respect to the centre. The technique is based on a transverse division of the area being designed. Each area is classified numerically, with respect to the four main directions or the compass (North, South, East and West). Moreover, the method indicates the approximate distance from the central point of the area being designed, by dividing the area into concentric zones.

The Kurdistan Region of Iraq has been chosen as a case study to validate the technique. The study begins with a quantitative study and many factors have been considered and examined, which may affect the adoption of LBI in developing countries - specifically within the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Furthermore, empirically, the main effective factors of LBI adoption have been found. In this regard, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and the Decomposed Theory of Planned Behaviour (DTPB) have been used as base models to test the factors that cause the adoption of LBI system in the region. The latent variables used in this study are government support (GS), self-efficacy (SE), perceived usefulness (PU), perceived ease of use (PEU), compatibility (COM), family and friends (FF), attitude (A), subjective norm (SN), perceived behaviour control (PBC) and behaviour intention (BI). Then another study has been conducted based on an open-ended questionnaire. The aim of this study is to ascertain the impacts of the LBI system in daily life. The study focused on five important points related to the accepted design of the LBI system by the users. The code format, the impact on technology, the necessity of having the system, the impact on the economy and the impact of policy, have all been studied and analysed based on the participants’ views. The final study was based on interviews to assess the outcomes of the current research. The participants have been chosen based on their experience and career position. Experts and decision makers in fields related to LBI systems have been chosen. The assessment is based on four different aspects, which are novelty, applicability, scalability and the flexibility of the proposed ideas of this research.

The study is based on the positivism philosophy to observe individuals behaviour toward using the LBI system. However, a deductive research approach has been applied to provide the research hypothesis. In the first and second questionnaire, 236 and 153 respondents are involved respectively. In addition, 7 interviewers have been participated for the study assessment.

The results encourage the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) decision makers to develop strategies that may lead to the adoption of LBI in the region. The selection of the design has been analysed to be based on the impact of the proposed system on the different sectors of the daily life. Furthermore, this proposed SR_LBI has been positively assessed by the interviewees and will be beneficial for developing countries that have the desire to start designing their own system.