Produce Food Safety in the Marketing Channel and the American Consumer
Abstract:
Publicity surrounding recent outbreaks of food-borne illness has raised concern among American consumers about the microbial safety of produce delivered through food marketing channels. In 2006 an E. coli outbreak was traced to spinach, resulting in millions of dollars in losses for the produce industry; in early 2008 a large salmonella scare linked to tomatoes also dampened industry profits. To investigate the effects of these concerns, a large random survey of American consumers from the Gallup Panel was performed in October 2008 to investigate the extent to which consumers were concerned about the microbial safety of produce and how they coped with those concerns in the food marketing channel. In addition, the survey investigated consumer perceptions about the efforts of government agencies and produce marketing channel members to ensure food safety. Survey results showed one-third of consumers had moderately high to high concerns about the microbial safety of produce, and that their concerns had increased over the previous year. Consumers who expressed higher concern used various coping mechanisms in the marketing channel more frequently than those with low concern, including keeping abreast of news reports, buying from farmers and farmers’ markets, shopping at organic markets, avoiding packaged fruits and vegetables, shunning produce grown in certain places, and examining produce more carefully in stores. Surprisingly, the level of concern was unrelated to knowledge about how fruits and vegetables are handled and inspected in the produce marketing channel; equal numbers of high- and low-concern consumers erroneously believe various government agencies and channel members regularly inspect produce on a day-to-day basis to ensure microbial safety, although high-concern consumers had lower levels of trust in government agencies and marketing channel members. The results argue that the public is insufficiently educated about governmental and marketing channel efforts to ensure food safety.
Recommended Citation:
Pennington, J., Rao, K., & Ball, D. (2009). Produce Food Safety in the Marketing Channel and the American Consumer. Paper presented at the American Association for Public Opinion Research, Hollywood, Florida.
Attached Documents:
- AAPOR 2009 Program (see page #55 for the mention)
- AAPOR Food Safety Paper