Consumer Acceptance of Genetically Modified Foods: Traits, Labels and Diverse Information

Abstract

New experimental economic methods are described and used to assess consumers'�willingness to pay for food products that might be made from new transgenic and intragenic�genetically modified (GM) traits. Participants in auctions are randomly chosen adult consumers�in major US metropolitan areas and not college students. Food labels are kept simple and focus�on key attributes of experimental goods. Diverse private information from the agricultural�biotech industry (largely Monsanto and Syngenta), environmental groups (largely Greenpeace�and Friends of the Earth) and independent third-party information is used to construct the�information treatments. Food labels and information treatments are randomized, which is a�deviation from traditional lab methods. Auctions are best described as sealed bid random n-th�price and not the standard Vickery 2nd price auctions. I show that participants in these�experiments respond to both food labels and information treatments, but no single type of�information is dominant�