Consumer behavior in choice of minimally processed vegetables and implications for marketing strategies

The purpose of this work is to stimulate the debate on the economic aspects of minimally processed fresh-cut production, assessing the purchase intentions of consumers of fresh-cut products. In order to gain this purpose and compare with the literature, results of previous on-field research, that involved consumers of fresh-cut lamb's lettuce (Valerianella Locusta Laterr), are presented and discussed. This work deals with the information collected as marketing and economic analysis on food products object of the research project \u201cNovel strategies meeting the needs of the fresh-cut vegetable sector \u2013 STAYFRESH\u201d. Intentions to purchase fresh-cut lamb's lettuce from environmental sustainable farms, simulating a fresh-cut product with an Eco-label, are investigated. Several studies referred to the approach that sets out different types of motives that affect attitude and willingness to pay for minimally processed products. The managerial implications make it possible to assess how much the different types of motives influence the attitude and affect the choices and the behavior of the consumers. To complete, a cost analysis of the fresh cut lamb's lettuce product is proposed. These results are proposed waiting for the Eco-labeling Board (European Union Eco-labeling Board) decisions on the feasibility of an Eco-label for food products. \ua9 2015 Elsevier Lt

Market opportunities for social farms

Although social farming is seen as a successful and innovative sector, social farms face various challenges, among which the need to find additional income required to stay in business. However, assuming that social farm food is considered as having ethical attributes, the research aims at investigating to what extent consumers are conscious of some ethical concerns (problems related to social hardship, social equity, food quality etc.), and whether this will create market opportunities for social farm food. The study area is the province of Pordenone (Italy). The results indicate that conscious consumers could represent an effective market channel also for social farm food, a notable opportunity for farms to improve their socioeconomic performance

An inquiry on north-eastern Italian farmers' perception of climate change and related risks to agriculture

Even though agricultural activities have always had to face systemic risk, increasing uncertainty linked to market conditions, policy revision and climate change require the adoption of extensive, functional and informed risk management strategies. Our study aims to investigate north-eastern Italian farmers’ perception of climate change-related risks and attitudes towards adaptation strategies, in order to promote the adoption of effective communication strategies and the development of more attractive insurance schemes to widen famers’ interests. Cross-sectional survey data were analysed using structural equation modelling to explore concerns over the impact of climate change on agricultural activities and identify the factors that promote the adoption of coping strategies. According to the results, the actual experience of negative consequences linked to specific extreme meteorological events is the main driver for the adoption of mitigation strategies. Further efforts on awareness of climate change and its consequences, coupled with the provision of simpler and more tailored insurance schemes, are required to support a widespread diffusion of adaptation strategies among farmers

An inquiry on north-eastern Italian farmers' perception of climate change and related risks to agriculture

Even though agricultural activities have always had to face systemic risk, increasing uncertainty linked to market conditions, policy revision and climate change require the adoption of extensive, functional and informed risk management strategies. Our study aims to investigate north-eastern Italian farmers' perception of climate change-related risks and attitudes towards adaptation strategies, in order to promote the adoption of effective communication strategies and the development of more attractive insurance schemes to widen famers' interests. Cross-sectional survey data were analysed using structural equation modelling to explore concerns over the impact of climate change on agricultural activities and identify the factors that promote the adoption of coping strategies. According to the results, the actual experience of negative consequences linked to specific extreme meteorological events is the main driver for the adoption of mitigation strategies. Further efforts on awareness of climate change and its consequences, coupled with the provision of simpler and more tailored insurance schemes, are required to support a widespread diffusion of adaptation strategies among farmers

Sunflower oil innovation, claim assessment and consumer’ motivations to accept this food

The food product innovation is advancing under pressure of: 1.st the growing request of innovations in foods products and processing challenging new consumers’ needs; 2.nd, the advance in nutrigenomics and its contribution to increase knowledge about the relation between nutrition and food, iii) biotechnologies contribution to create customized food products to satisfy a variety of customers’ needs (Hobbs, 2002).           An emerging food product category is the nutraceutic food, contributing to satisfy ‘nutrients’ and ‘medical needs; beside it is easier with genomic techniques the original food composition to challenge the customers’ needs it must be considered the consumers’ adverse reaction for any technique used to change the food product composition. Purpose of this research is to suggest a modification of the sunflower oil composition obtained with genomic technique to change the product from bulk commodity to enhanced specialty food with health claims. The traditional bulk commodity market is based on uniform quality standard, higher volume of production priced at the minimum marginal cost. The specialty market segment demands products with distinctive attributes of higher quality and safety standards, more varieties and sustainability, supported by marketing mix strategies to set up higher prices and better margins according with customers’ preferences. A growing importance in consumers’ preferences are the combination of nutritional, health and environmental attributes that must be properly communicated with ad hoc messages describing the product’s claim. To test the consumers’ awareness about healthy claim and willingness to accept these enhanced food products, an explorative SEM analysis is conducted with a questionnaire. The results suggest that the consumer is in favor of the health and environmental care, nevertheless it is opportune to examine in deeper the causes (health claim, technology and environmental impact, communication, culture and others) to convince the consumers to adopt these functional product. The first part of the research is dedicated to analyze the innovations and demonstrate the scientific evidence of the health claims of the modified sunflower oil, describing the role of PUFA (Poly-unsaturated fatty acids).  It is discussed the metabolic pathway of the eico-esanoid EPA and DHA generated from modified sunflower oil, responsible of benefic effects on the human metabolism. The second part is dedicated to the inference about the consumers’ acceptance of this functional sunflower oil using SEM model. It is our conviction that this procedure will open new perspectives of food innovation in creation of nutrition and healthy food  to satisfy the growing population in the world.

MCDM approach for planning a sustainable livestock enterprise

Beside the livestock activity provides excellent nutritional ingredients for the human diet, growing conflict among stakeholders are caused by the sharing of the property rights about the environment. Traditionally livestock management was focused on profit maximization related to scale economies, however an increasing number of stakeholders are concerned about the negative side effect of environmental externalities and solicit to adopt sustainable technologies to curb the natural resource depletion, soil and water pollution, gaseous emissions and others. Purpose of this paper is to introduce a revisited multi-criteria decision making approach based on solid theoretical fundaments to produce sustainable solutions to achieve economic, social and environmental objectives

Language, Ethnical Identity and Consumer Behavior: A Cross-Cultural Study of Marketing Communication in the Region FVG

In the multiethnic EU contest, the European Institutions encourage all citizens to be multilingual by learning at least two languages in addition to their mother tongue, including the local languages to maintain alive their cultural backgrounds and preserve their ethnic identity. The objective of this study is to verify whether the local language used in marketing communication strategies could significantly affect the consumers’ preferences for food product and their decisions. The theoretical framework is given by the consumer motivational approach that enlarges the traditional consumer theory including other determinants of consumers decisions as the language and ethnicity; the empirical analysis is performed with the multivariate conjoint analysis to evaluate the influence of the cross cultural influence in consumer’s choice. A number of students from the university of Udin have been interviewed with a questionnaire focusing on preferences for a simulated packed sandwich product distributed by vendor machine inside the University space to test the influence of local language. The results suggest some reactions to the messages reported by package in different languages depending on the level of language knowledge and suggest their use for potential demand segmentation to generate niche markets. These results can be generalized to the many regional markets in the EU where the identity construct evocated by the local language can be used in market communication strategies to increase the local food demand and customization

Marketing relazionale nella filiera delle agroenergie

Il presente lavoro si \ue8 posto l\u2019obiettivo di analizzare, attraverso la formulazione e la stima di un modello di equazioni strutturali, quanto l\u2019evoluzione del paradigma del marketing transazionale, nella sua recente declinazione a Marketing Relazionale, possa fornire un nuovo approccio manageriale al contesto delle attivit\ue0 agricole ed agroindustriali, contesti produttivi che hanno l\u2019opportunit\ue0 di utilizzare la sostenibilit\ue0 ambientale come leva comunicazionale, caratterizzando la propria operativit\ue0 anche verso la produzione di agro/energie, quali ad esempio il bioga

Consumers demand for social farming products: An analysis with discrete choice experiments

This paper analyses the demand for social farming (SF) products. In particular, we investigate the preferences of consumers who buy their products from large retailers, rather than from solidarity purchasing groups or other niche markets using a sample of 225 consumers. In this regard, a discrete choice experiment (DCE) was carried out to estimate the willingness to pay (WTP) a premium price for the purchase of a common product (i.e., eggs) from farms that employ disabled people. The attributes considered in our DCE design are the employment of disabled people and two additional attributes which may have ethical implications for the choices. The results indicate that consumers are interested in buying SF products, with about 74% of the sample willing to buy the eggs produced by social farms and the average WTP being equal to \u20ac1.36 for a pack of six eggs. Moreover, the average WTP for the use of labour of disabled people attribute amounted to \u20ac0.69 for a pack of six eggs