• Login
    View Item 
    •   ResearchSpace Home
    • College of Agriculture, Engineering and Science
    • School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences
    • Agricultural Extension and Rural Resource Management
    • Doctoral Degrees (Agricultural Extension and Rural Resource Management)
    • View Item
    •   ResearchSpace Home
    • College of Agriculture, Engineering and Science
    • School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences
    • Agricultural Extension and Rural Resource Management
    • Doctoral Degrees (Agricultural Extension and Rural Resource Management)
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    Development of network theory approaches to analyse cause and effect relationships in complex integrated sugarcane supply and processing systems.

    Thumbnail
    View/Open
    Thesis. (1.842Mb)
    Date
    2013
    Author
    Sanjika, Thawani M.
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    Abstract
    Network theory has been widely and successfully used to model, analyse and visualise complex systems. This study aimed to develop approaches to analyse complex integrated sugarcane supply and processing systems. A literature review includes network theory, complex systems, the Theory of constraints, indicator analysis and root cause analysis. The cause-and-effect networks of four sugarcane milling areas in South Africa; viz. Eston, Felixton, Komati and Umfolozi were developed, where the factors that negatively affected the performance of the milling areas were represented by vertices, the relationships among the factors by arcs and the strength of these relationships by weights. Three network theory based analytical tools namely; (a) primary influence vertex analysis, (b) indicator vertex analysis and (c) root cause vertex analysis were developed to analyse the networks. The results from the analyses indicate variations in the numbers and strengths of primary influence factors, problem indicator factors and root causes of problems between the four milling areas. Rainfall, drought and high soil content in sugarcane were identified as the strongest primary influences in the respective milling areas. High crush rate variability, low cutter productivity, running behind allocation and increases in operating costs were identified as the strongest indicators of poor performance in the respective milling areas. Rainfall was found to be the most dominating root cause of poor performance in all the milling areas. Since the South African integrated sugarcane production and processing system is complex, it is likely that the unique approaches developed in this study can be used successfully to also analyse other relatively complex systems. It is recommended that these approaches be tested within other systems. The main contribution of this study is in the form of a relatively easy-to-use network theory based comprehensive systems analyses tool. This analytical approach has, to the author's knowledge, not been used in any agri-industrial application previously.
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/10413/9461
    Collections
    • Doctoral Degrees (Agricultural Extension and Rural Resource Management) [17]

    DSpace software copyright © 2002-2013  Duraspace
    Contact Us | Send Feedback
    Theme by 
    @mire NV
     

     

    Browse

    All of ResearchSpaceCommunities & CollectionsBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsAdvisorsTypeThis CollectionBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsAdvisorsType

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    DSpace software copyright © 2002-2013  Duraspace
    Contact Us | Send Feedback
    Theme by 
    @mire NV