Up Cycling

Up Cycling

Research Proposal

Introduction

The term up cycling refers to the process that involves converting of waste materials or other useless goods into better products. According to Sears et al (2010), products and materials that are produced through up cycling are of better quality and have better value as compared to its original product or material. There are various benefits of up cycling to people and to the environment as well. For instance, one of the advantages of u cycling is that it helps in converting useless materials and products into use. Therefore, some of the materials and products those are of no use and make useful. Another importance of up cycling is that it helps in cleaning the environment. Some of the materials that are not being used within the society may decay resulting to pollution. Hence, by up cycling them, it reduces chances of pollution to the environment (Kalimo, 2006)). Additionally, up cycling also helps in job creation especially for the low income earners. For instance, textile industries those are located within the low socioeconomic status create employment opportunities to poor people within such areas.

Similarly, the practice of up recycle also creates self employment opportunities to people with skills and experience on their areas of specialization. For instance, individuals who specialise in tailoring do up recycled used clothes to make other products such as babies’ napkins. Consequently, by practicing up cycling, these individuals are able to generate their income for their up keep and other activities that require spending as revealed by Landy and Conte (2009). Moreover, another importance of up cycling is that it provides cheap and readily available raw materials to manufacture. Most of the materials that are used in up cycling are easy to obtain at an affordable price as they are of no use to people. Therefore, it makes it easy for individuals and organisations that practice up cycling to obtain raw materials easily (Pappu et al, 2007).

However, in the absence of up cycling, it results to various negative impacts to people and environment as well. For instance, non practice of up cycling leads to environmental pollution. When waste materials are left for a long period of time, they do decay or rot, resulting to air, water and soil pollution. Such pollutions affect people’s health and other practices that people involves in their daily operations (Merrild (b), 2008). Another problem associated with non-practice of up cycling is lack of enough materials and products that people use as their basic wants. For instance, absence of up cycling of clothes results to lack of clothes for people to wear. Hence, production of enough products and services to be realised, then the practice of up cycling must be encouraged and maintained. Another problem that many companies face is lack of raw materials to produce other products and services as found by Alves et al (2012). Therefore, the only approach to obtain these materials is through up cycling. As a result, the practice of up cycling helped organisations to produce cheap and timely products to their clients.

Research Proposal Objectives

Based on the importance of up cycling towards production of quality and timely products, this research proposal provides information on the proposed project that discusses up cycling as cultural material that responds to flux such as markets, history and emotions.

Research Questions

Some of the questions that will be considered in conducting the proposed project include:

What are the factors that influence the practice of up cycling?
What are the merits and demerits of up cycling?
What are challenges that are faced in the practice of up cycling? and
What are the problems faced as a result of non practice of up cycling?

Key Words:

Up Cycling

Literature Review

In the process of conducting the proposed research project, it would be required that relevant literature materials be used. These are literature materials that contain relevant information based on the research questions. For instance, through the research that were conducted by Schettini et al (2013) found that the practice of up cycling is important because it helps in putting into use some of the products and materials that had no use before. Some of these products and materials such perishable goods when left for sometimes without being used may rot resulting to air pollution. Similarly, supporting the importance of practising up cycling of waste materials within the society is Alves et al (2013) who found that the practice of up cycling is an important practice because it helps in producing more durable products than the original products and materials. Therefore, by up cycling, customers are advantaged because they get the quality and timely products at affordable prices.

However, on the contrary opinion is Merrild et al (2012) who realized that despite up cycling has a positive impact to both people and the environment, but it also results to negative effects to people and their environment. For instance, Merrild et al (2012) found that during up cycling, the used products and materials produces dangerous gases and soot from the machines used in up cycling. When these gases are inhaled, they block human braking system resulting to difficulties in breaking. Moreover, when soot is released to air, it results to the formation of acid rain that corrodes houses during down pour. In order to deal with the above effects of up cycling, Pappu et al (2007) suggested that organizations need to come with better up cycling process that will reduce the damage done on the environment.

According to Unnisa and Rav (2012), the practice of up cycling is important because it helps in creating and maintaining the flow of products within the market. During their research, Unnisa and Rav (2012) found that due to lack of enough natural resources, some projects are less in the market in relation to their demands. Therefore, through the practice of up cycling, it makes it easy for companies to produce these products. Likewise, in the support on the use of up cycling process in producing products is Cohen (2011) who revealed that through the practice of up cycling, helps in the reduction of commodities prices in the market. According to Cohen (2013), most textile industries nowadays are involved in up cycling their products because the price of producing clothes through up cycling is cheaper than obtaining and use the original cloths in their production. In the process, they sell their products at cheaper prices to their customers.

Bosch (2006) also found that through the practice of up cycling, people are able keep their environments clean by reusing some of the materials that could not be disposed. For instance, Bosch (2006) said that certain waste products such as products manufactured from plastic cannot decay but they make our environment dirty. Therefore, through the practice of up cycling is of great importance because it makes it easy to reuse some of the products and materials that could not be disposed despite their uselessness. Thus, through the use of the above literature materials, it will helps in answering some of the questions in the research study. In order to ensure that the selection of the above literature matures to be achieved, information contained in them will be scrutinised thoroughly by comparing the information with research questions.

Methodologies

One of the requirements that would be used during the proposed research study is real data. Hence, the collection of data will be one of the major activities for the research (Crane, 2008). Although there are different types of data collections, some of the recommended data collection methods to be used during the study include observations, interviews and filling of the questionnaires. More than one data collection method will be used to help in the generation of accurate data for accurate findings to be obtained (Cargan, 2007). Therefore, different textile organizations and market places will be selected as target places for data collections. Moreover, different businessmen and customers will also be targeted as they are the end users of these products. Within the selected organisations and market places, the above methods of data collection will be applied during data collection. Through the use of interviews, different groups of people, this will compost of organizational managers, businessmen and customers will be interviewed.

The interview will compost of 20 questions that the selected group will be asked and their responses recorded down. Interviewee will be expected to give short and accurate answers to the asked questions. After ensuring all the questions are well answered, they will be stored privately awaiting the analysis process. Apart from the use of the interview as a method of data collection, another recommended data collection is filling of the questionnaires (Pawar, 2004). Through the use of this method of data collection, approximately 14 questions will be structured that require short answers from the interviewee. Therefore, the selected groups will be required to take their time to read the questions and understand them before giving any answer. Some of the questions that the interviewee may be unable to understand will be left blank in order to avoid collection of inaccurate information.

Apart from filling of the questionnaires, the last method that will be used during data collection is observation. Researchers will be required to visit various organisations that produce their products through up cycling. The main reason is to find out the materials used, time taken to produce a product and some of the challenges that they face during the production process (Axinn and Pearce, 2006). Observations that will be made will be recorded although some of the questions will be in the interview and questionnaires, but they will still be recorded for comparison during data analysis, which is the next stage of the project after data collection.

Challenges that may be experienced during the research period

In the process of conducting the above proposed research project, there are some challenges that may be experienced. For instance, because the project would require a lot of travelling and other expenses, some financial problems may be faced. Apart from financial problem, another problem that may be faced during the research process is a selection of the industries, market places and customers to interview. Therefore, willing customers and businesspersons will be selected randomly while organisations will be selected through official visit letter requests. Moreover, another challenge that will be experienced during the research study is a language barrier (Merrild (a), 2012). Some of the people to be interviewed may not be able to understand the official language, which is English. Therefore, a translator will be required to translate the questions into the language that these people understand. Despite expecting the above challenges, it will be ensured that there are proper measures in dealing with the problems in their occurrences.

Timeline of the project

The proposed project is scheduled to run for a period of one year as shown in table 1 below;

Activity	Description of the Activities	Duration/Time
Feasibility Study	Investigations of the importance and challenges of the proposed project	1 Months
Data Collection and Recording	Collections of data and information through observation, interviews and questionnaires	4 Months
Data Analysis	Analysis of data collected during data collection period	4 Months
Project Implementation	The process of putting the project into use.	3 Months

Conclusion

Use of up cycling is an important practice because it results to putting into uses some useless products and materials. Moreover, it helps an increase in food production resulting to reduction of food prices in the market. Additionally, it helps organisations to obtain cheap materials that can be converted to quality products. However, in the process of practising up cycling, it is important for companies to use machines and equipment that are not harmful to human health and its environment. Otherwise, up cycling should be practised.

References:

Alves, J.O., Tenorio, J.A.S., Zhuo, C. And Levendis, Y.A. (2012). Use of Stainless Steel AISI 304 for Catalytic Synthesis of Carbon Nanomaterials from Solid Wastes. Journal of Materials Research and Technology, 1(3), 128-133.

Axinn, W.G. and Pearce, L.D. (2006). Mixed Method Data Collection Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bosch, P.D. (2006). Cycling: A Year Round Plan. London: Meyer & Meyer Verlag.

Cargan, L. (2007). Doing Social Research. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Cohen, N. (2011). Green Business: An A-to-Z Guide. Thousand Oaks: SAGE.

Crane, P.E. (2008). An Investigation of Data Collection Methods Applicable in Groundwater Research in Rural Region of Developing Nations. Michigan: ProQuest.

Kalimo, H. (2006). E-Cycling: Linking Trade and Environmental Law in the EC and the U.S. Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publisher.

Landy, F.J. and Conte, J.M. (2009). Work in the 21^st Century: An Introduction to Industrial and Organizational Psychology. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.

Merrild (a), H., Larsen, A.N. and Christensen, T.H. (2012). Assessing recycling versus incineration of key materials in municipal waste: The importance of efficient energy recovery and transport distances. Waste Management, 32(2012), 1009-1018.

Merrild (b), H., Larsen, A.N. and Christensen, T.H. (2008). Life cycle assessment of waste paper management: The importance of technology data and system boundaries in assessing recycling and incineration. Resources, Conservation and Recycling, 52(2008), 1391-1398.

Pappu, A., Saxena, M. And Asolekar, S.R. (2007). Solid wastes generation in India and their recycling potential in building materials. Building and Environment, 42(2007), 2311-2320.

Pawar, M.S. (2004). Data Collection Methods and Experiences: A Guide for Social Researchers. New York City: Sterling Publisher Pvt. Ltd.

Schettini, E., Santagata, G., Malinconico, M., Immirzi, B., Mugnozza, G.S. and Vox, G. (2013). Recycled wastes of tomato and hemp fibers for biodegradable pots: Physico-chemical characterization and field performance Resource, Conservation and Recycling, 70(2013), 9-19.

Sears, S.K., Sears, G.A. and Clough, R.H. (2010). Construction Project Management: A Practical Guide to Field Construction Management. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.

Unnisa, S.A. and Rav, S.B. (2012) Sustainable Solid Waste Management. Boca Raton: CRC Press.