Quantitative analysis

You are to select an appropriate quantitative data analysis technique for each of the six (6) individual tasks below. DO NOT attempt to use the same data analysis technique for each task as that is not possible. Results MUST be presented in tables/figures appropriate for the data analysis technique used. An explanation of the results and relationship to SDG 12 are required (see the submissions document instructions for details).

The critical quantitative analysis tasks are:

1. Compare the average tonnes of cane harvested for each mill region for 2019, 2020, and 2021.
2. Compare the total number of hectares harvested for each mill region for 2019, 2020, and 2021.
3. Determine if there a significant difference between the tonnes of cane crushed and the tonnes of sugar IPS, produced for each region and each year? 
4. Determine if there is a trend in the total hectares harvested for each mill region (compare 2019, 2020, and 2021).
5. Compare the average tonnes of cane harvested by your selected Queensland sugar cane mill company’s mills, against the tonnes of cane harvested by the other Queensland sugar cane mill companies’ mills.
6. Determine if there a significant difference between the tonnes of cane crushed and the tonnes of sugar IPS, produced for your Queensland sugar cane mill company’s mills.

Qualitative analysis

You are going to conduct a critical qualitative analysis (inductive) of your Queensland sugar cane mill company’s website. Look at your Queensland sugar cane mill company website. Does the website homepage project responsible production and consumption (UN SDG 12)? To answer this question, you need to analyse the homepage as follows:

Begin with the homepage photos, for each photo consider:

1. Who and/or what is in the photo?
2. What is happening in the photo?
3. What visual image is the photo trying to project?
4. What is in the foreground of the photo (the focus)?
5. How is light used (dark/bright; sunny/cloudy etc)?
6. Does the accompanying text inform you more about the photo?

Discussion of image analysis:

Provide a comprehensive, synthesised discussion of your results DO NOT just write each question and then an answer. Discuss how/if the images project the company’s alignment with responsible production and consumption (UN SDG 12).

Next, read through the text on the homepage, you are using thematic analysis to understand the text on the homepage.

1. Read the text and get familiar with what is being said. At this step look for general themes to begin with and keep notes. Think about what you need to code and the codes you can use to accurately describe the content. Remember SDG 12, you could code according to different methods of responsible production, and consumption (e.g., power fed into the grid). Keep notes, write down how and why you have coded your data, and what this means. This assists you as you work through the text and back through the text (this is an iterative process), you need to know what you have done before and why you did that.
2. Go through your initial codes carefully, look for patterns and themes. For example, the text you are looking at relates to animals, you have initial codes of dogs, giraffes, leopards, flies, crickets, and mosquitos. From these codes you can see two themes (aka categories). The codes of dogs, giraffes, leopards, would fit the theme of mammals, while the codes of flies, crickets, and mosquitos, would fit the theme of insects. As you work through the text you may notice sub-themes, for example, the theme may be mammals, and sub-themes domesticated or wild. Your notes should show how your codes were interpreted and combined into themes.
3. Review your themes and check everything categorised as a theme fits the text. Check the themes actually exist in the text, are any missing? Are you certain your themes are accurate and comprehensive? If there is too much information under one theme it may be too broad and may require dividing into two or three themes. Remember, keep track of what you have done and any changes to themes in your notes.
4. You spent time at step 3 refining your themes, now it is time to finalise them and give them a label. At this step you can create a table of two columns. In the first column put the names of your themes, in column 2, beside each theme provide a detailed description of the theme. Make certain the theme names reflect the properties of the theme and are not ambiguous. You can use more than one word to label your theme.

Discussion of text analysis:

Discuss the results of your text analysis, focusing on the UN SDG 12 topic. You are not to just paraphrase, you need to tell a clear coherent story with selected quotes to support your points. Concept maps, and/ or models and/or graphic images, and/or word clouds must be used to support your results.

Conclusion:

Conclude with a section that brings together (synthesises) the results of your quantitative and qualitative critical analyses and how they support or do not support the UN’s SDG 12. 

Recommendations

Provide recommendations to the sugar cane mill owners on how to move the branding they project on their website to align more closely to the UN’s SDG 12.