Mariarosaria Simeone

Product reformulation in the food system to improve food safety. Evaluation of policy interventions.

The objective of this study is to understand the level of attention that the consumer awards to a balanced diet and to product ingredients, with a twofold purpose: to understand whether food product reformulation can generate a competitive advantage for companies that practice it and to evaluate the most appropriate policy interventions to promote a healthy diet. Reformulation strategy, in the absence of binding rules, could be generated by consumers. Results from qualitative research and from empirical analysis have shown that the question of health is a latent demand influenced by two main factors: a general lack of information, and the marketing strategies adopted by companies which bring about an increase in the information asymmetry between producers and consumers. In the absence of binding rules, it is therefore necessary that the government implement information campaigns (food education) aimed at increasing knowledge regarding the effects of unhealthy ingredients, in order to inform and improve consumer choice. It is only by means of widespread information campaigns that food product reformulation can become a strategic variable and allow companies to gain a competitive advantage. This may lead to virtuous results in terms of reducing the social costs related to an unhealthy diet.

Does quality really matter? Variables that drive postmodern consumer choices

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into the factors that affect consumer choices for both policymakers and food companies. Design/methodology/approach – Four hundred questionnaires were administered in the city of Florence (Tuscany, Italy). Data analysis was carried out according to a two-step procedure in a multivariate statistical framework: in the first stage, a multiple correspondence analysis was performed; in the second step, the single-link (nearest neighbour) cluster analysis allowed three homogeneous groups of consumers to be identified on the basis of their specific socio-demographic characteristics. Findings – Three consumer clusters were obtained: the first, “critical but non-philanthropic consumers”, who may have pathologies that require a particular diet; the second, “marginally critical consumers”, for whom freshness, the label and the assortment count for much; the third, “agnostic consumers”, who choose a product according to its origin and the price/quality relati...

Factors Affecting Food Label Complexity: Does the New EU Regulation Satisfy Consumer Issues? An Exploratory Study

ABSTRACT There is still a substantial information asymmetry between producers and consumers. Despite the recent EU regulation on labeling to enhance consumer food safety and the existence of a number of certifications on sustainable food products, there remain blind spots in the widely debated consumer information issue. Our study, conducted on primary data processed with a probit model, was aimed at identifying the factors that may affect consumer response in relation to difficulties in interpreting the labels of processed food products. Starting from theoretical models, several factors held responsible for defining the consumer’s knowledge were used as explanatory variables. Our results show that despite changes in the new legislation, there remains the problem of the consumer’s lack of knowledge concerning environmental labeling and product certification.

Which are the sustainable attributes affecting the real consumption behaviour? Consumer understanding and choices

Purpose This is an exploratory study on consumer information and behaviour towards green, health, local, social and environmental credentials on labels. It focusses on many dimensions of sustainability in the food products that affect consumer choices with a dual purpose: to identify and define “sustainable consumption” behaviour in broad sense and to investigate empirically the factors affecting the real consumption behaviours. The purpose of this paper is to shed light on consumers’ understanding, motivation and use of sustainable labelling in order to understand the role sustainability information plays in the food products market. Design/methodology/approach Two focus groups in order to investigate consumer motivation and behaviour in-depth and to prepare the questionnaire. Identification of the outcomes that could summarize sustainable consumption combining: purchase of local products, consume only seasonal fruit, prefer products with recyclable packaging, attention to the fat content in foods, give importance to traceability and purchase products only in the place of origin. Identification of the “at risk” virtuous consumer, using a binary logistic regression approach, taking into account demographic characteristics, the food and nutrition value system, experience, knowledge, institutional factors and marketing. Findings Results from the focus groups are mainly in line with the empirical analysis, highlighting the key role of education in influencing consumer attitude and behaviour. Consumers give little attention to information provided on the label for sustainable food consumption and environmental protection and have little knowledge of environmental problems. The virtuous consumer appears to give importance to a better food nutrition value system, to pay more attention to ingredients and instructions on the label, to be more attentive to environmental and sustainable attributes, to be concerned about product quality and to be slightly influenced by brands and special offers. Research limitations/implications The findings from the empirical analysis confirm the results from focus groups even if it was not possible from the empirical analysis to investigate in-depth the marketing aspects concerning the food choice. This limit probably comes from the low number of observations. Further research will focus on these marketing aspects. Practical implications Products with sustainable attributes can become a strategic variable and allow companies to gain a competitive advantage, especially for small- and medium-sized enterprises. This may encourage the development of new marketing channels based on the direct relationship between producer and the new consumer demand, increasingly sensitive to the food security issues. Social implications There is a potential interest and sensitiveness to having sustainable behaviour in a broad sense, but there is a lack of knowledge about how to behave to be sustainable. In the absence of binding rules, it is necessary that government promote information and campaigns to generate greater awareness on sustainability, aiming at increasing knowledge to drive the consumer’s choices. This may lead to virtuous results in terms of reducing social costs related to an unhealthy diet, food waste and unsustainable consumption. Originality/value The results show that despite the appearance of attention to the environment and to healthy food which is associated with this emerging critical consumer in the literature, there remains the problem of the consumer giving little attention to information provided on the label for sustainable food consumption and environmental protection. This is the problem of “rules of thumb” in purchasing decisions that prevail in the following situations: when consumers have an overload of information that exceeds their processing limits; when they tend to base their decision making on heuristics, focussing their choices on brands as a proxy for high-quality, product-related characteristics.

The growing influence of social and digital media

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to devise and then test a theoretical model to illustrate the effects of the increasing importance of social media on consumer behavior and market equilibrium in differentiated food industries. Design/methodology/approach The authors use game theory to model the strategic use of social media by firms producing high-value food products. The authors test the predictions of the theoretical model by means of a survey of 722 randomly selected Italian food consumers using an online questionnaire. Findings The model predicts that, as social media become more and more influential, consumers using the new media become more informed, and their concern about food quality attributes increases. At the same time, the consumers using mass media only receive less information and they prefer cheaper products to the high value one. As a result, the emergence of social media favours market segmentation and the hypotheses tested were: Social consumers are, on average, more informed than mass consumers and more concerned about environmental issues than mass consumers. The data support the theoretical model. Originality/value The paper contributes to the debate about the impact of information from interested sources on market equilibrium, providing an innovative analysis of the role of social media.

Product Attributes and Purchasing Behaviour: How Parents’ Food Choices Can Act on Their Children’s BMI? Empirical Evidence from a Case Study

BACKGROUND Given the epidemic proportions and economic costs associated with nutrition related diseases in Western countries, an empirical study was carried-out between September and December 2014 in Campania, the Italian region with the highest prevalence of obese children. METHODS The survey was conducted in a secondary school and involved 145 children, aged 11 to 14, and their parents, with the ultimate aim of studying the relationship between the behaviour of parents regarding the use of nutrition labels, the attention to product quality and the body weight of their children. RESULTS The results from our study showed that unhealthy diet concerned stems from the misguided food choices of their parents, who are responsible for their childrens dietary habits, lifestyle and body weight. CONCLUSION In order to incentivise adults and young people to change their food choices and eating behaviour in favour of healthy and sustainable lifestyles, some useful measures could involve the improvement of political marketing and advertising, labelling clarity and better information and awareness campaigns to do sport and eat healthily. Finally some recent patents related to healthy reformulated food products and communication strategies, with specific regard to healthy eating, have been reviewed.

Capitale umano e capitale sociale nell’agricoltura multifunzionale: un’analisi delle esperienze di filiera corta nella Campania interna

The attention to business networks, therefore to the business relationships among companies, supply chain operators, manufacturers and consumers, aimed at commercial transactions, exchange of information, sharing of norms and associations of resources become an asset in the definition of modern strategies of competitive advantage for agribusiness companies. In this perspective, the short chain represents an interesting business model network, rooted in the specific territorial context, which, through specific organizational characteristics and diversified multi-functional activities, is enhanced by human and social resources, internal and external (at the company), and able to act on the local aggregation process and territorial value creation. Share capital and human capital become, therefore, the determining factors for the effectiveness of the short food supply chain experiences, especially in the inland areas, and for wider dissemination and sharing of the value created. Aim of this work is an analysis of the functional relationships between social capital and human capital in farms, diversified and multifunctional, which have taken paths of short chain. For this purpose, the empirical verification aimed to investigate how the quality of human capital affects the effectiveness of relational networks and how it could lead to have impacts on the performance of short chain, improving its ability to create value for the enterprise and for the territory. The results of the study made possible to understand the mechanisms and the strategic variables of this innovative mode of direct governance of transactions between producer and consumer-citizen, in specific territorial rural systems, and to indicate useful policy implications.

How can food companies attract the consumer concerned about food safety? A logit model analysis in Spain

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore food safety attitudes among a sample of Spanish consumers and determine which variables, among those studied, most affect the probability of the consumer being attentive to food safety. Design/methodology/approach The study was conducted using a logit model. From the questionnaire 20 binary category variables were identified. Having selected the variable “Are you worried about safety food” as a dependent variable, the authors used binary logistic regression (Aldrich and Nelson, 1984; Borooah, 2002) to ascertain in what way the remaining 19 variables affect the likelihood of the consumer being particularly attentive to the healthiness and safety of food purchased. Findings The probability of the consumer being particularly attentive to food healthiness and safety, for the sample in question, is higher in consumers who stated that they were familiar with organic products, those who are attentive to fat contents in foods and those who value the presence of quality certification positively. Research limitations/implications Future research into Spanish consumers with the same methodology should target a larger sample in several Spanish cities. Originality/value This paper investigates not only Spanish consumer attitudes to food safety, but also how other variables can influence the probability of the consumer being concerned about food safety. This approach may be very useful for food companies to determine what strategies to adopt to attract the category of consumers who lend special importance to the food safety variable in their purchases.

Gli investimenti diretti esteri nell’Unione europea allargata: evoluzione nel settore agroalimentare

Foreign direct investments (FDI) are very important means of economic integration. In the last two decades FDI have been the most dynamic component of integration between the European Union and Central and Eastern European countries. This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the distributions and of the geographical pattern of FDI between the European Union and the Central and Eastern European countries, after processing data provided by Eurostat and Unctad. Moreover, once showed the FDI trends, particular attention will be focused on their importance in the food sector.

Sostenibilità ambientale ed economica nella produzione di tonno rosso mediterraneo: la ricerca di una nuova soluzione di equilibrio

The economic sustainability of bluefin production is strictly correlated to the increasing protection of environmental sustainability of the sector, regulated at international level through the quota instrument. The studies conducted recently, have opened discussions on the division of the total allowable catch (TAC) considering the opportunity of establishing a new allocation of the (TAC) in favour of the other hemisphere, determining the reduction of bluefin production in the Mediterranean sea. This paper begin with a theoretical discussion of the quota as an instrument of the policy maker and then focuses on the microeconomic effects that a possible change in its allocation could have on the profit of bluefin producers. The theoretical analysis shows that the actual equilibrium between economical and environmental sustainability could be subjected to progressive changes, which, if not corrected with adequate strategies, will always be to the disadvantage of the first. Dealing with this reduction, in order to remain on the market, would be possible only if they are able to maintain the profitability of this production through the use of appropriate strategies aimed to increase the value of the Mediterranean bluefin. These strategies would favour the establishment of a new equilibrium between the economical and the environmental sustainability. In the actual scenario the latter arises strongly and it is important to evaluate the opportunity of finding new tools in order to be competitive on the market. Therefore, in this paper, after showing the peculiarities of the Mediterranean bluefine, we have analysed the more appropriated strategies to increase the added value of this typology of territorial bluefin production in the area where it is concentrated and where, since the ancient time, there is a consolidated tradition in the production and consumption of this product.