Food fraud and consumers' choices in the wake of the horsemeat scandal

Purpose – In 2012, the European food industry was hit by a food fraud: horsemeat was found in pre-prepared foods, without any declaration on the package. This is commonly referred to as the “horsemeat scandal”. The purpose of this paper is to investigate consumers’ preferences across Europe for a selected ready meal, ready to heat (RTH) fresh lasagne, to consider whether the effects of potential food frauds on consumers’ choices can be mitigated by introducing enhanced standards of RTH products. Design/methodology/approach – An online survey was administered to 4,598 consumers of RTH lasagne in six European countries (Republic of Ireland, France, Italy, Spain, Germany and Norway), applying discrete choice experiments to estimate consumers’ willingness to pay for enhanced food safety standards and highlight differences between countries. Findings – Many similarities across countries emerged, as well as some differences. Consumers in Europe are highly concerned with the authenticity of the meat in ready mea...

[1]  Joan L. Walker,et al.  Identification of parameters in normal error component logit-mixture (NECLM) models , 2007 .

[2]  M. Loureiro,et al.  A choice experiment model for beef: What US consumer responses tell us about relative preferences for food safety, country-of-origin labeling and traceability , 2007 .

[3]  C. Lagerkvist,et al.  Country of origin or EU/non-EU labelling of beef? Comparing structural reliability and validity of discrete choice experiments for measurement of consumer preferences for origin and extrinsic quality cues , 2014 .

[4]  D. Phillips,et al.  Consumer Risk Perceptions and Marketing Strategy: The Case of Genetically Modified Food , 2013 .

[5]  Alessandro Banterle,et al.  Nutrition and health claims: Who is interested? An empirical analysis of consumer preferences in Italy , 2015 .

[6]  L. Miller,et al.  The effects of nutrition knowledge on food label use. A review of the literature , 2015, Appetite.

[7]  Carlos Flavián,et al.  The influence of consumer involvement on quality signals perception , 2009 .

[8]  F. Yamoah,et al.  Assessing Supermarket Food Shopper Reaction to Horsemeat Scandal in the UK , 2014 .

[9]  W. Verbeke,et al.  Chinese consumers' understanding and use of a food nutrition label and their determinants , 2015 .

[10]  A. Gracia,et al.  Consumer preferences for food labeling: What ranks first? , 2016 .

[11]  K. Willis,et al.  Willingness-to-pay for renewable energy: Primary and discretionary choice of British households' for micro-generation technologies , 2010 .

[12]  K. Lancaster.  A New Approach to Consumer Theory , 1966, Journal of Political Economy.

[13]  Ellen Goddard,et al.  A Taste for Safer Beef? How Much Does Consumers’ Perceived Risk Influence Willingness to Pay for Country‐of‐Origin Labeled Beef , 2014 .

[14]  Jayson L. Lusk,et al.  Consumer Demand For And Attitudes Toward Alternative Beef Labeling Strategies In France, Germany, And The Uk , 2001 .

[15]  M. Loureiro,et al.  Estimating Consumer Willingness to Pay for Country-of-Origin Labeling , 2003 .

[16]  Peter Shears.  Food fraud - a current issue but an old problem , 2010 .

[17]  R. Lion,et al.  Risk/Benefit Communication about Food—A Systematic Review of the Literature , 2016, Critical reviews in food science and nutrition.

[18]  Morten H. J. Fenger,et al.  Delicious words - assessing the impact of short storytelling messages on consumer preferences for variations of a new processed meat product , 2015 .

[19]  L. Berg.  Trust in food in the age of mad cow disease: a comparative study of consumers' evaluation of food safety in Belgium, Britain and Norway , 2004, Appetite.

[20]  K. Grunert.  Current issues in the understanding of consumer food choice , 2002 .

[21]  K. Foster,et al.  Quality Certification vs. Product Traceability: Consumer Preferences for Informational Attributes of Pork in Georgia * , 2009 .

[22]  J. Spink,et al.  Defining the public health threat of food fraud. , 2011, Journal of food science.

[23]  F. Leroy,et al.  Convenient meat and meat products. Societal and technological issues , 2015, Appetite.

[24]  Kenneth Train,et al.  Discrete Choice Models in Preference Space and Willingness-to Pay Space , 2005 .

[25]  James Kliebenstein,et al.  Valuing Food Safety in Experimental Auction Markets , 1995 .

[26]  M. Cano,et al.  Nutritional characterisation of commercial traditional pasteurised tomato juices: carotenoids, vitamin C and radical-scavenging capacity , 2006 .

[27]  K. Grunert.  Food quality and safety: consumer perception and demand , 2005 .

[28]  D. McFadden,et al.  MIXED MNL MODELS FOR DISCRETE RESPONSE , 2000 .

[29]  L. Thurstone.  A law of comparative judgment. , 1994 .

[30]  Alberto Bernués,et al.  Labelling information demanded by European consumers and relationships with purchasing motives, quality and safety of meat. , 2003, Meat science.

[31]  Natalia Rubio,et al.  Brand awareness–Brand quality inference and consumer’s risk perception in store brands of food products , 2014 .

[32]  Riccardo Scarpa,et al.  Designs with a priori information for nonmarket valuation with choice experiments: A Monte Carlo study , 2007 .

[33]  Ortwin Renn,et al.  Potential methods and approaches to assess social impacts associated with food safety issues , 2010 .

[34]  W. Verbeke,et al.  Consumer interest in information cues denoting quality, traceability and origin: An application of ordered probit models to beef labels , 2006 .

[35]  D. McFadden.  Conditional logit analysis of qualitative choice behavior , 1972 .

[36]  L. Frewer,et al.  Consumer needs and requirements for food and ingredient traceability information , 2012 .

[37]  Wuyang Hu,et al.  Chinese consumers’ preferences and willingness to pay for traceable food quality and safety attributes: The case of pork , 2015 .

[38]  Diána Bánáti,et al.  Consumer response to food scandals and scares , 2011 .

[39]  Áine McConnon,et al.  Consumers' confidence, reflections and response strategies following the horsemeat incident , 2016 .

[40]  B. Halkier,et al.  Trust in food safety in Russia, Denmark and Norway , 2005 .

[41]  J. Louviere,et al.  The Role of the Scale Parameter in the Estimation and Comparison of Multinomial Logit Models , 1993 .

[42]  Kristine M. Grimsrud,et al.  Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy in Japan: Consumers' Food Safety Perceptions and Willingness to Pay for Tested Beef , 2005 .

[43]  Wim Verbeke,et al.  European consumer preferences for beef with nutrition and health claims: A multi-country investigation using discrete choice experiments , 2014 .

[44]  R. Scarpa,et al.  Deriving and Testing Efficient Estimates of WTP Distributions in Destination Choice Models , 2009 .

[45]  P. Jackson,et al.  How message framing affects consumer attitudes in food crises , 2015 .