Webbasierte Kommunikation in der indirekten Vermarktung biologischer Lebensmittel

Welche Chancen und Möglichkeiten bieten soziale und webbasierte Medien wachsenden Unternehmen des Bio-Sektors, den in Punkto Vertrauen, Transparenz und Glaubwürdigkeit so wichtigen Kontakt zwischen ProduzentInnen und KonsumentInnen herzustellen? Inwieweit und mit welchem Erfolg werden diese Medien von den Unternehmen genutzt beziehungsweise wo werden diesbezüglich Stärken und Schwächen verortet? Dazu liefert dieser Beitrag erste Ergebnisse einer im Rahmen des europäischen Forschungsprojektes ‚HealthyGrowth – From niche to volume with integrity and trust‘ durchgeführten Befragung mit Akteuren verschiedenster Wertschöpfungsketten

Full case study report: Biohof Achleitner - Austria

Biohof Achleitner is located in the fertile Eferding basin along the Danube in Upper Austria. The business has grown significantly in the last 15 to 20 years and is a good example of the growth potential of organic farming through diversification into several business branches and cooperation with other farms. In 1986 Mr. Achleitner and his wife took over the 20 hectare vegetable farm from his parents. In 1990 they converted fully to organic farming. Today, apart from their own agricultural production (farming of vegetables and grain) they also run an organic wholesale, an organic restaurant (‘Kulinarium’) and attached to it a small shop (‘Frischmarkt’) for vegetables, fruits, bread, wine, cheese, cosmetics and a variety of other products. Moreover, since 1998 they also started delivering organic products to households, which is currently the largest box scheme in Austria. Today, customers have the opportunity to decide between eleven different box offers (i.e. from office boxes to mother/child boxes) to be delivered every one or two weeks. Apart from fresh fruits and vegetables, the customers can also choose from a huge variety of other organic products as the ‚Biohof Achleitner’ complements his product line with imports of organic wholesalers and a number of domestic suppliers for various product groups. Furthermore, customers receive a weekly newsletter (‘Kundenbrief’) with ecological issues or cooking recipes, etc

Value based supply chains to meet the expectations of organic consumers - A case study from Austria

The contribution revisits the results of a case study conducted in 2009, eliciting quality aspects within a mid-scale values based supply chain. Its main objective is to show how organic values can be combined with new forms of relationships in enlarged regional food supply chains beyond direct marketing. Actors along the supply chain employ similar quality argumentations and a similar understanding of fairness and social sustainability. Moreover their perceptions comply to a large extend with the expectations of consumers. Regional embeddedness and spatial proximity is a key element to achieve this synergy

Full case study report: Bioregion Mühlviertel - Austria

The ‘Bioregion Mühlviertel’ represents a territorial approach towards regional development based on a strong organic agriculture sector. The Mühlviertel region is located in the province of Upper Austria (yellow) and comprises the four districts (above the blue line in Graphic 4 marking the river Danube) of Freistadt, Perg, Rohrbach and Urfahr-Umgebung (covering 122 municipalities). On 3090km2 the area inhabits 270.000 people with a density of 92 people/km2. The agriculturally used area is 2580km2 of which again around one quarter gets cultivated organically. Also the proportion of organic farms (≈26%) is higher than the national average of around 17% (BMLFUW, 2014). The development process of setting up the Bioregion began in 2010. All in all around 1200 people were contributing to the process of establishing the Bioregion. During numerous workshops and events a long-term development concept was elaborated together with stakeholders. Currently 7 Austrian Leader-regions and the Euregio "Bayrischer-Wald/Böhmerwald" are involved

Full case study report: Bio vom Berg - Austria

‘Bio vom Berg’ is best described as a producer owned brand, operated by the cooperative ‘BioalpineGen.’, which covers a full range of organic products, produced, processed and sold mainly in the region of Tyrol/Austria (see red circle in Graphic 1). The supply chains involve about 600 farmers who produce mainly milk but also fruits and vegetables, eggs, meat or cereals. Additionally, a number of processors (one big regional dairy for fresh milk and yoghurt, 10 local small dairy cooperatives for cheese, a butcher for meat, a chocolatier, a bakery and most recently a mill and a dairy processor for yoghurt in South Tyrol) are involved. Marketing and distribution is done mainly (accounting for about 60% of the turnover) through a regional family based supermarket chain (MPreis). Furthermore, the grain is processed by a large regional bakery (Ruetz), which sells its organic bread under the brand name ‘Bio vom Berg‘. Other (minor) marketing channels include organic wholesalers in Germany, a specialist chocolatier in Styria and a number of partners supplying via wholesalers the gastronomy sector and some small specialized shops in the region. The case was considered for investigation under the HealthyGrowth project because Austria has a very strong retailer/discounter sector and a remarkable direct marketing sector as well. ‚Bio vom Berg‘ aims to link these two aspects by selling the best from the organic mountain farmers in the regional retailing supermarket

Case study report - Biohof Achleitner (Austria)

Most local organic market chains have inherent problems in moving from niche to volume, and mainstream large-scale market chains have inherent difficulties in securing and advancing organic values. The project “Healthy Growth: from niche to volume with integrity and trust” investigated a range of successful mid-scale organic value chains in order to learn how they are able to combine volume and values, and to use this knowledge to support the further development of organic businesses, networks and initiatives. Research teams from ten European countries contributed with 20 case studies. More information and documentation can be found at: www.healthygrowth.e

Case study report - Bio vom Berg(Austria)

Most local organic market chains have inherent problems in moving from niche to volume, and mainstream large-scale market chains have inherent difficulties in securing and advancing organic values. The project “Healthy Growth: from niche to volume with integrity and trust” investigated a range of successful mid-scale organic value chains in order to learn how they are able to combine volume and values, and to use this knowledge to support the further development of organic businesses, networks and initiatives. Research teams from ten European countries contributed with 20 case studies. More information and documentation can be found at: www.healthygrowth.e

The perception of organic values and ways of communicating them in mid-scale values based food chains

The rise of the organic sector in the past has led several businesses, cooperations and enterprises to prosperous growth. Organic products are gaining more and more popularity and proof successfully their ability to hold ground against conventional products on supermarket shelves. The crucial question remains how to maintain the original quality principles and values associated with the organic sector in times of over proportional growth. The growing distance between consumers and producers reduces obviously the possibilities for direct feedback loops which in turn has consequences for farmers’ identification with their products at the point of sale. These issues encouraged partners from 10 different countries, to examine within the frame of the Core Organic ERA-net Project ‘HealthyGrowth’ factors supporting and hindering integrity and trust within growing organic businesses. The project focusses on mid-scale values-based food chains as a potentially promising alternative between direct marketing and anonymous conventional marketing channels. This paper combines a review of scientific literature on values associated with organic products by consumers and producers with the ‘Detailed Case Study Descriptions’ provided by project partners to assist case study selection. This shall allow answering the following questions: What are qualities and values that stakeholders along the value chain want to communicate and how can they successfully be communicated down- as well as upstream? How can effective communication substitute face to face relations in terms of relationship and trust

How is the communication of values, qualities, and motivations supported along the value chain from producer to consumer and vice versa?

First, we consider it helpful to give a short introduction into the topic of communication and share some reflections why this aspect is important to look at in the frame of the HealthyGrowth project. The general question is why communication is necessary and what the purpose of communication is. One aspect commonly mentioned concerns information as a means of marketing. As Karstberg (2015) notes: “Research shows that a significant barrier to consumers purchasing more organic foods is lack of information. This leads the relevant body of research to call for better communication around organic foods.” Zanoli and Naspetti (2002:652) expressed the need “to devise a better communication strategy” with a view to “informing consumers about the extra quality inherent in organic food” (Duffy et al. 2005:374). And Aertsens et al. (2011) add that consequently, “consumers’ lack of knowledge concerning organic food is an important factor slowing down growth”. So communication is of utmost importance when it comes to aspects of growth of the organic sector. However, ultimately communication is the basis of every human interaction. It is the process by which we create sense and meaning and built up relationships with each other. Communication is thus to be understood in its broadest sense, so that actually everything that carries meaning or conveys a message is to be understood as communication. It therefore comprises all forms of audio-visual interactions between people (face-to-face conversations, phone calls, skype/web-meetings etc.) as well as artefacts like receipts, contracts, e-mails, all forms of publication materials (e.g. brochures, leaflets, flyers, radio or TV commercials, video clips, newspaper ads etc.) and – not to forget – of course also the (organic) products themselves. This said the next point in question is what the purpose of communication is specifically within values based organic food chains. Regarding the overall objective the HealthyGrowth project, we are primarily interested to investigate the role of communication for maintaining trust and integrity during growth processes. In this respect, communication becomes particularly important for collectively developing desired qualities, discussing which values to communicate, establishing fairness,loyalty, identification and trust or simply negotiating volumes and prizes. Moreover, it plays also a crucial role for increasing the knowledge of stakeholders involved along the supply chain

WP-3 Guideline for Data Collection

The deliverable D3.1 of the HealthyGrowth project describes the methodological guideline for case studies selection procedure