GM Foods: A Nanjing Case Study of Chinese Consumers' Awareness and Potential Attitudes

It is widely recognized that biotechnology is one of the most innovative technologies developed in the 20th century with an even more promising future in the 21st century. Biotechnology is currently a hot topic in both academic and political circles for its implications on food security, economic growth and income distribution, human health, the environment, and agricultural trade. Genetic modification techniques are at the center of this focus and have spurred worldwide debate on biosafety issues. Many regard these new techniques as a potential threat to human life, to existing plant and animal species, and to the environment. These concerns have resulted in government regulations in some countries that have tightened monitoring, supervision, and control of research and commercialization of genetically modified (GM) varieties, especially GM foods. Alternatively, many GM crop varieties have shown superiority over conventionally grown crops in terms of higher yield, pest and/or disease resistance, nutritional improvement, and a longer shelf life. Globally, GM crop planted areas expanded from 1.7 million hectares in 1996 to 44.2 million hectares in 2000 and is expected to continue to expand (James, 2002). Similar trends have occurred in China (Huang, Rozelle, Pray, & Wang, 2002). In 2002, the Chinese government established a set of regulations requiring labeling of GM foods. Although implementation has been postponed, the implication of such regulations is important to all parties involved— consumers, producers, processors, and international traders of GM foods, as well as research institutes and enterprises who produce GM seeds and associated inputs. In many cases, the public sector has also been impacted due to its significant investment in this new technology. Some argue that these regulations may impose additional costs on manufacturing, marketing, and transportation of GM foods, reducing the competitiveness of GM foods over conventional foods, and hence slowing technological developments. Others argue that consumers should be fully informed of the benefits and risks associated with biotechnology and ensured the right to make their own decisions in the marketplace. In this case, no matter how the production, marketing, and labeling of GM foods are regulated, as long as they are labeled in some way, consumers’ awareness and acceptance might be the longrun decisive factor of their success in the marketplace— partly due to consumers’ purchasing behavior of GM foods and partly due to the potential influence of public opinion on government regulations. This article seeks to assess Chinese consumers’ awareness of and potential attitudes toward GM foods and to identify major factors influencing these attitudes as assessed by telephone interviews in the city of Nanjing. Additionally, a preliminary analysis of media reports on GM foods was conducted for the 1995-2001 time period. These media reports serve as an important source of information that may influence consumers’ attitudes. The remainder of this article is organized as follows: the next section reviews recently conducted surveys of consumer attitudes toward GM foods in various countries. The third section discusses basic assumptions and the approach adopted in this research. Next, we describe our survey design and sampling procedure used in telephone interviews. This is followed by a disFuning Zhong Nanjing Agricultural University