Nationalist Movement of Quebec within Post Confederation Canada

Methodology

Introduction

The methodology section provides information the strategies that would be used to collect data about the SMEs for the study, how data will be collected from these SMEs and the important aspects of the data that will have to be taken into consideration. The focus of this study is on Mainstreaming Biodiversity Conservation in the Tourism Sector Development in Jordan (BITS) Project. To achieve this, the study will need to elaborate on the present biodiversity condition of the protected areas (PAs), how the existing SMEs can be used to protect the current PAs, how the existing SMEs can be involved in maintaining biodiversity to ensure the mutual sustenance of the natural balance and give incentives on how biodiversity can be maintained while at the same time ensuring that promoting the local culture.

Research Design and Site

According to Creswell & Creswell (2017), research design means strategies chosen to combine different study components in a logical and consistent manner, ensuring that the research problem is addressed effectively. Basically, research design provides the blue print that guides in collecting, measuring, and analyzing data. For this project, three project areas have been proposed. They include: Petra, Dibeen, and Wadi Rum. In each area, two SMEs will be chosen, one small and one medium. The three areas were chosen because they are among the most important tourist destinations in Jordan. Consequently, they have seen a rise in the number of SMEs looking to take advantage on the vast inflow of tourists.

Petra is a unique place with castle and well preserved location and studies have revealed that maintaining  it for posterity has its own benefits in terms of not only responsible tourism but also for the social uplifting of the people engaged in the tourism industry directly/indirectly to reap the benefits. Dibeen is a forest reserve with lots of flora & Fauna as such in the same way it needs to be preserved from the onslaught of manmade & natural calamities. The participation of Locals has a potential in safeguarding this forest reserve. Wadi Rum is a famous desert wilderness of Jordan which has recently seen the spurt in sustainable tourism with the help of local Bedouins.

It would be important to consider SMEs with known efforts to implement biodiversity efforts and those that have yet taken the initiative to implement the same. Small SMEs were taken to be those with a total number of employees not exceeding 50 while medium SMEs were taken to be those that had more than 50 employees but less than 250 in total. The small ones had to have a turnover of around $15million while the medium ones had to have a turnover of around $60 million to warrant consideration.

Using Saunder et al. (2012) will help in explaining the research design. The researcher gave the research design in the form of an onion. The research design is defined in terms of layers where every layer represents every method and aspect of the research until the centre of the core is reached. The figure below shows each layer.

Figure 1: Research Onion

Source: (Saunders et al., 2012)

1.0.1.      Research Philosophy

Research philosophy outlines the framework of rules that define goals of the study. The research philosophies include positivism and constructivism. In this research, positivism philosophy is used because it is based on determining How developing SMEs can help in mainstreaming biodiversity in the protected areas . According to Edirisingha (2017), positivism relies solely on collecting research evidence through statistics and experiments to help in knowing how a society works. Qualitative data is used in this study. The research uses explanatory approach to identify and answer the research objectives and questions. In explanatory research, a researcher connects their ideas and thoughts in creating casual relations in the overall study (Jackson, 2015). Research Approach

In research design, there are normally two approaches. They include: inductive and deductive approaches. In this research, inductive approach is used. The approach involves collecting data and applying existing theories to analyse the data following the research objectives. With inductive approach, there is identification of gaps and understating research background.

Time Horizon

There are normally two time horizons to choose from: cross-sectional and longitudinal. Cross-sectional time horizon is used in this paper. As a result, there is never a fixed demographic for the sample population. In the sample, there is never a fixed age, gender, race, income distribution or ethnicity. Therefore, it is apparent that cross-sectional time horizon has been employed in the research. The cross-sectional time horizon that was used in the research was never prolonged and was done within a specific period of time where studies were limited to a particular period of time.

Sampling

Sampling techniques will be used to determine the participants of the study in each of the six businesses that will be used. Sampling refers to the process of selecting a section of the population for study to arrive at a general conclusion about the entire population from where the sample was taken (Christensen et al., 2011). Jordan is one of the countries fast rising to recognize the value that can be derived from diversity. As a result, most companies within Jordan have a diverse workforce. It is expected that the population that will be involved in this study will be diverse. It is important to know the perception of different people pertaining to the efforts that SMEs can make to help in protecting the current protected areas and how the SMEs can be involved in protecting biodiversity to ensure that the natural balance is sustained. The true picture of their feelings can only be captured if they are sampled since it would be difficult to tell who to include and who to leave out in these studies. Sampling was arrived at because it is cheaper and faster. Therefore, it would save a lot on cost and time. Participants to this study will be selected randomly to ensure that there is no biasness in the process. Both systematic and random samplings will be used in the selection process.

Random Sampling

In random sampling, there is normally no organization such that each participating sample has an equal chance of being selected (Christensen et al., 2011). Random sampling will be employed in determining the participants for the study. Using this sampling method will ensure there is never any biasness in the selection of the participants of the study. Every employee in the selected companies will have an equal chance of participation.

Stratified Sampling

According to taken Christensen et al. (2011), stratified sampling technique involves dividing the total study population into smaller groups to facilitate the completion of the sampling process. The selection of the study population will also involve this sampling method. This sampling will be necessary to save on time and cut costs. The sampling process will therefore need stratified sampling and to enable sampling of the employees based on their ages. Twenty employees will be sampled from each company to make the sample population one hundred and twenty. Using stratified sampling will ensure that the findings are more representative.

Data Collection

Data collection will follow the sampling f the participants. The needed data will be collected from the population that will be chosen. Data collection will be done through interviews and administration of questionnaires. The expectation is that all the participants to the study will be cooperative. Taking into account the fact that employees might not fully cooperative, there will be need to further review secondary sources to ensure that there is enough information to corroborate what the primary findings of the study.    

Questionnaires

According to Sullivan-Bolyai, Bova & Singh (2014), a questionnaire is an instrument that contains a series of questions meant to help in gathering information from respondents in a survey. A questionnaire could also be defined as carefully organized and selected questions designed to help in collecting facts regarding a particular matter under consideration. With regards to this study, questionnaires will be designed to help gather information from the participants of the study from all the companies that are involved. The questions answered by the employees will be kept confidential and there is no way their answers will be tracked back to them. Questions will be divided into those that are meant for the regular employees that those that are supposed to be answered by the top management

Interviews

According to Sullivan-Bolyai, Bova & Singh (2014), interviews are “qualitative research techniques” that involve conducting face-to-face question and answer session with a select group of respondents in a study. Interviews will be used on respondents that will be available and can be reached easily. Only a select few will be considered because the technique can be expensive especially when having respondents in various locations. The primary targets for the interviews will be the managerial staff.

Secondary Sources

Secondary sources were created by people who performed their own research and never participated on the conditions that are currently being researched. Secondary sources could be articles, scholarly books, periodicals, and journals. The sources that will be used are those that are believed to have published on factual findings. They must be renown sources that are concrete and reliable and whatever is published in them must be confirmed to be reliable. These sources must be authentic and must be confirmed to be have been from credible authors who would never have undermined their credibility by putting out unverified information. It is also difficult that many authors will come to a decision to write the same things on different platforms and in different circumstances. In these sources, whatever prevails most is likely to be more factual and should never be ignored. Therefore, this method of data collection is characterized by soliciting information from various sources to ensure that we paint a more conclusive picture. What the authors agree on are normally in the results sections of their studies. The information in there must be compared with what the interviews and the questionnaires will yield. The data collection will therefore be supplemented with secondary sources to help back up the foundations of the questionnaires and the interviews.

Data that will be collected from the SMEs

Vast amount of data will be collected from the SMEs. First, it would be important to establish if the companies in question are indeed SMEs. Therefore, it would be important to gather general information about them including their annual revenues and the number of employees they have.

The next data that will be collected from the SMEs is on what they believe the current biodiversity condition of the protected areas is. This information is necessary to know if they are happy with their surroundings of if they feel that there is a state of imbalance that needs to be addressed. If they acknowledge that there is a state of imbalance, it would be important to ask them to identify areas they feel the imbalance exists. At this point, it would also be important to get their opinion on how they feel that particular imbalance can be addressed.

The next is to inquire from the respondents if they their companies have any biodiversity and sustainability goals and objectives in place that they are always working to meet. This information will be important to collect because it would be a pointer towards the commitment to ensure sustainability and biodiversity. This will help in explaining the current situation and establish if the SMEs are working towards a common goal. Information gathered from here can be used to harmonize their goals so that they can put their efforts on a common good.

Another data that would need to be collected from the SMEs is if they have witnessed any natural or man-made calamities that threatened to undermine the biodiversity of the protected area. It is also important to know how frequently those calamities occur and the kinds of threats that they bring to the areas. It is important to know the steps that were taken to respond to these calamities, the contribution they made and if they were satisfied with the entire recovery process or if they feel something could have been done better. If any, what could have been done? This information is important to determine because it would provide a perspective on how threatened the protected area is and how likely it is that it would remain sustainable into the foreseeable future.