Reference no: EM133362391

Assignment Overview

This is an individual assignment. For this sustainability research project, you will be choosing an industry sector to focus on (agriculture, or Information technology)

You will be responsible to research the sustainability priorities and challenges for this sector. 

After researching the stainability priorities and challenges, you will be offering recommendations for how a company in this sector can improve their sustainability.

The Content

After some thought you decide that your research report should answer the following questions: 

1. What is sustainability and CSR? Provide a definition for each of these terms.
2. What THREE sustainability challenges are most relevant to businesses in your sector in Canada? Why are they relevant?
3. What are businesses in your sector doing to manage those challenges? Please provide a description of THREE companies demonstrating best practices.
4. Based on the above, describe THREE sustainability actions you would recommend a company in your sector of choice undertake considering your research.

Clarifications

• Sector/Company: You should choose a real industry sector for the recommendations that you will make for a company operating in the sector.
• Audience: Remember that your audience may not be familiar with the concepts of sustainability and CSR. You should be clear in your discussion and definitions
• Question 3: When mentioning best practice examples, you should focus on what specific businesses do (or say they do). You may refer to what other actors such as the government or other organizations do to help businesses in this area, but this is not what is being asked here.

Assignment Structure

Note that it is the contents that counts, rather the length of the assignment.  However, a thorough examination of this topic will probably require 4-5 single-spaced pages (12-point font) to adequately discuss this topic. Please do not exceed 5 pages. Figures are not part of the page count so feel free to use them to support your report. The body of the paper should be divided into appropriately numbered sections, sub-sections, sub-sub-sections, etc., each with descriptive titles. Please follow the following order:

Title Page (1 page)

The title of your report should be informative and specific to draw the reader's attention.

Executive Summary (No more than 1 page)

Here you should summarize the main points of your report to give your reader a whole picture of the research when they have no time to read it all. This should be at the beginning of the paper, as it is a summary of your paper, you should write this section after you have completed the research and recommendations.

Introduction (No more than 1/2 page)

The introduction should provide the context for this report: why it was written and why the topic that you will present in the rest of the report is important. You should also define the objectives that will guide the rest of the report. You should also describe the sector you have chosen so that the readers know what to expect. 

Research Questions 1-3 (No more than 2.5 pages)         

This is the main part of your assignment where you present the findings of your research. You may use the research questions (1 through 3) as the basis to structure this part.

1. What is sustainability and CSR?
2. What THREE sustainability challenges are most relevant to businesses in your sector in Canada? Why are they relevant?
3. What are businesses in your sector doing to manage those challenges? Please provide a description of THREE companies demonstrating best practices.