Digging deeper: How do different types of organic consumers influence the increasing organic market share?

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how sub markets with different degrees of maturity develop during a period of general organic growth, and how different consumer segments behave on these sub markets. The paper uses actual purchasing behaviour of six consumer segments with different attitudes towards food in general and organic production and products in particular. The data is from the Danish market for organic foods, which is one of the most mature markets in the world. The segmentation splits consumers into a positive and a non-positive half, each half consisting of three different segments. The estimations show that the development in general organic consumption varies between segments, and that their behaviour varies between sub markets. The positive half of the population has driven the overall growth in organic budget share at the Danish market over the period 2005 to 2007, while the other half have not changed their consumption significantly. The results indicate that for the most dedicated organic consumers, the organic budget share may be approaching a saturation point for some types of food, but also identifies other types of food which still have a growing organic budget share, even among the most dedicated consumers. The combination of attitudes and actual behaviour for a large number of consumers is new, and the results provide a valuable contribution to the ongoing investigation of organic consumers, and provide new nuances to the understanding of the latest organic growth.organic budget shares, organic consumers, consumer segments, latent class analysis, demand

Udviklingen i det økologiske forbrug

I DETTE KAPITEL undersøges, hvordan forbruget af økologi har udviklet sig i perioden fra 2005 til 2007. Resultaterne viser, at de segmenter, der er beskrevet i kapitel 1, har meget forskellig adfærd både med hensyn til udvikling i generelt øko-forbrug og med hensyn til udvikling inden for forbruget af økologi i specifikke varegrupper. Overordnet set har den ene halvdel af befolkningen drevet den generelle vækst i øko-andelen, vi har set i perioden, mens den anden halvdel ikke har ændret sit forbrug signifikant. Med hensyn til forbrug i specifikke varegrupper er det interessant, at øko-andelene for frugt og grønt er steget relativt meget, og at en stor del af denne stigning kommer af, at nye husstande er begyndt at købe økologi. Kapitlet beskriver også, hvordan de forskellige segmenter fordeler deres indkøb på butikstyper. Det viser sig, at disse mønstre ikke har ændret sig i perioden, så den observerede stigning i øko-andele skyldes ikke, at folk er begyndt at købe mere ind i butikker med fokus på økologi. Det tyder altså på, at udbuddet af økologi er steget i alle typer af butikker. Resultaterne viser også, at alle køber en stor del af deres økologi i discount-supermarkeder, og understreger dermed, at udbuddet af økologi i de relativt billige butikker må fastholdes og eventuelt udvides, hvis man ønsker at fremme forbruget af økologiske fødevarer. Samtidig køber alle segmenter dog så meget ind i supermarkeder, der ikke fokuserer ret meget på økologi, at der er grund til at tro, at det samlede salg af økologi kunne øges, hvis udbuddet af økologi blev øget i disse supermarkeder

A study of anti-fat bias among Danish general practitioners and whether this bias and general practitioners' lifestyle can affect treatment of tension headache in patients with obesity

Objectives: The study investigated whether treatment options for episodic tension-type headache vary among general practitioners (GPs) in Denmark depending on the patients’ weight status and gender, and whether these decisions can be explained by the GPs’ own anti-fat bias and lifestyle. Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire study with responses from 240 GPs on measures of anti-fat bias, healthiness of GPs’ lifestyles, and reported patient treatment decisions. Results: GPs tended to exhibit negative explicit and implicit anti-fat bias. There were no differences in choice of medical treatment for patients with obesity and those of a normal weight. GPs were more likely to advise a general health check to a patient with obesity (p < 0.001). GPs treating a male patient with obesity were less likely to believe that their patient would comply with the advised treatment compared to those with a male patient of normal weight. Compared with other patient types (4.4–7.7%), GPs who treated a male patient with obesity (27.9%) were more likely to advise a general health check only and no diary-keeping or follow-up consultation (p < 0.001). This was explained by the healthiness of the GPs’ lifestyles (Spearman’s ρ = 0.367; p < 0.01). Conclusion: Despite the presence of clear anti-fat bias, there were no differences in medical treatment, and GPs managed the general health of patients with obesity proactively. The fact that the GPs’ own lifestyle influenced the likelihood that they would recommend diary-keeping and follow-up consultations for male patients with obesity is remarkable and requires further investigation

A multidimensional measure of animal ethics orientation:Developed and applied to a representative sample of the Danish public

We present a questionnaire-based measure of four animal ethics orientations. The orientations, which were developed in light of existing empirical studies of attitudes to animal use and ethical theory, are: animal rights, anthropocentrism, lay utilitarianism, and animal protection. The two latter orientations can be viewed as variants of animal welfarism. Three studies were conducted in Denmark in order to identify the hypothesised orientations, evaluate their concurrent validity, and report their prevalence and relevance in animal-related opinion formation and behaviour. Explorative factor analysis (Study 1) and confirmative factor analysis (Study 2) successfully identified the four orientations. Study 2 revealed good measurement invariance, as there was none or very modest differential item functioning across age, gender, living area, and contrasting population segments. Evaluation of concurrent validity in Study 2 found that the orientations are associated with different kinds of behaviour and opinion when the human use of animals is involved in the hypothesised directions. In Study 3, a representative population study, the animal protection orientation proved to be most prevalent in the Danish population, and as in study 2 the four orientations were associated with different behaviours and opinions. Remarkably, the animal protection orientation does not lead to increased animal welfare-friendly meat consumption, the main reason for this being non-concern about the current welfare status of farm animals. We argue that the developed measure covers a wide range of diversity in animal ethics orientations that is likely to exist in a modern society such as Denmark and can be used in future studies to track changes in the orientations and to understand and test hypotheses about the sources and justifications of people’s animal-related opinions and behaviours.</div

Økologiske forbrugere i Danmark – hvem er de?

I DETTE KAPITEL tegnes et billede af danskernes holdninger til økologi og deres indkøbs- og forbrugsadfærd i forhold dertil. Dette gøres ved at beskrive forskellige grupper, såkaldte segmenter, af danske husholdninger. Det viser sig, at økologisk forbrug i Danmark ikke længere udelukkende bæres af en lille, eksklusiv gruppe af overbeviste forbrugere, som formentlig stod for størstedelen af forbruget i 1990’erne. I kapitlet beskrives to yderligere segmenter, der er positivt indstillede til økologiske fødevarer. De forbrugere, som falder ind under det ene segment, kan kaldes mad-engagerede, mens det andet segment består af forbrugere, vi kalder discountorienterede. Disse to segmenter har en relativt stor interesse for økologi, dog ikke med samme dedikation som de overbeviste. De adskiller sig fra hinanden i forhold til involvering i mad og indkøbsvaner. Tilsammen udgør de tre positivt orienterede segmenter ca. halvdelen af de danske husholdninger, og de står for en meget stor andel (cirka 87 procent) af det økologiske forbrug. Der kan identificeres tre yderligere segmenter, der består af forbrugere, som ikke ser nogen særlig grund til at købe økologiske produkter og derfor fravælger dem på grund af den højere pris. På baggrund af den nuancerede viden om segmenterne, der præsenteres i kapitlet, fremsættes det sandsynlige fremtidsscenarie, at efterspørgslen efter økologiske varer vil gå i to retninger. Den ene retning repræsenteres af folk, som vil efterspørge varer, der, ud over at være økologiske, skal være etisk forsvarligt produceret. Den anden retning repræsenteres af forbrugere, som fortsat kun vil købe økologiske varer, hvis de er relativt billige og nemt tilgængelige. Idet begge efterspørgselstyper udgør betragtelige dele af den samlede økologiske afsætning, synes det fortsat at være den rigtige strategi med et dobbelt fokus – både på produktionen og på salgs-og distributionsleddene, hvis man vil fremme forbruget af økologiske fødevarer