Management of Environmental Security Through Organic Agriculture. Contribution of Consumer Behavior

Abstract

peer reviewedThe general goal of the research was to integrate organic food consumer behavior into the topic of the management of environmental security. The detailed objectives were to determine Romanian consumers’ beliefs about organic food and its role for environmental security, to identify consumers’ judgement of environmental problems, to establish the influence that demographic and social variables have on consumers’ beliefs and to emphasize the relationship between these. A random survey on 413 organic food consumers from North-Western Development Region of Romania was developed. A set of positive beliefs of organic food consumers regarding organic food and its contribution to environmental security are displayed by the present research: organic food is consumed because it is healthy (80% of tested consumers believe so) and it helps to protect the environment (75% of consumers). The study reveals there is a statistically significant difference between consumers who believe humanity faces threatening environmental problems and those who do not, concerning the strength of belief that organic food helps protecting the environment more than conventional food (p<0.05). An original aspect of the paper is the investigation of the Romanian organic food consumers’ beliefs from the perspective of environmental security. The set of variables selected to characterize consumers’ beliefs from the environmental security point of view may be considered the novelty of the paper