Consumer preferences towards local food products in Austria and Portugal

Abstract

Locally produced food has increasingly gained attention in recent years. Consumers are getting more and more conscious about their consumption behavior and often buy a product for reasons that relate to their priorities or perceptions, such as the environmental or economic impact. Although substantial literature on conventional and organic food is available, the topic of local food products is not well explored yet. Moreover, consumption behavior towards local food in Austria and Portugal and, subsequently, the cultural impact has not been analysed yet. Therefore, this study aims to explore consumer preferences towards local food products in both countries. In order to get a better understanding of consumer behavior towards locally produced food, both primary and secondary research was conducted. For this purpose, a survey among 198 people in Austria and Portugal was performed. The main findings of this paper indicate that consumers prefer local food to foreign products, with product attributes, environmental protection and economic welfare being the most important drivers. In addition, the study revealed that Austrian consumers have a higher preference and willingness-to-pay for local food products than Portuguese. Moreover, willingness-to-pay was not found to be sensitive to information cues relating to the environment or the economy. A possible explanation for this result is that consumers are already aware of the environmental and economic benefits of local food.

Date of Award	17 Feb 2017
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Fernando Machado (Supervisor)