IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/ijofsd/198918.html

Consumer Attitudes, Knowledge, and Behavior in the Russian Market for Organic Food

Author

Listed:
  • Meixner, Oliver
  • Haas, Rainer
  • Perevoshchikova, Yana
  • Canavari, Maurizio

Abstract

In the past few decades, the market for organic food has developed well in Western European countries and comparable markets like the United States or Canada. While these markets are now approaching market saturation, other markets still have huge potential for growth and are therefore of special interest to export companies. In this paper, we analyze the demands, knowledge, and expectations of the emerging market in Russia. It is well documented that the Russian market for organic food has had a much higher growth rate than Western markets in recent years. According to the USDA, the Russian market grew significantly during the last years. The increase might also be due to changes in Russian consumers’ behavior. However, some challenges must be considered when entering the Russian market with premium products: (1) a large number of low‐income consumers are not able to pay for premium products, and (2) up until now, there have been no official organic labels available in Russia, and, therefore, it is likely that the Russian population lacks knowledge of what organic food is and which requirements are connected to the organic production process. Considering these restrictions, we analyzed important factors affecting Russian consumers’ food choice on the one hand and their knowledge of organic food on the other. This paper presents results for one specific product (organic potatoes), which can be considered to be a typical alternative to low‐priced, conventional products. A conjoint analysis was conducted in Saint Petersburg (n = 300) to investigate the importance of the buying attributes of organic potatoes. While the results are not representative of the whole Russian market, they show crucial differences in consumer attitudes compared to Western markets and confirm that the average consumer knowledge about this product category remains low. These findings offer valuable information to those stakeholders of the supply chain who want to enter a market with high growth rates but obvious shortcomings.

Suggested Citation

  • Meixner, Oliver & Haas, Rainer & Perevoshchikova, Yana & Canavari, Maurizio, 2014. "Consumer Attitudes, Knowledge, and Behavior in the Russian Market for Organic Food," International Journal on Food System Dynamics, International Center for Management, Communication, and Research, vol. 5(2), pages 1-11, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:ijofsd:198918
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.198918
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/198918/files/Oliver%20Meixner_%20Rainer%20Haas_%20Yana%20Perevoshchikova_%20Maurizio%20Canavari_110%20-%20120.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.198918?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rousseau, Sandra & Vranken, Liesbet, 2013. "Green market expansion by reducing information asymmetries: Evidence for labeled organic food products," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 31-43.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Camelia F. Oroian & Calin O. Safirescu & Rezhen Harun & Gabriela O. Chiciudean & Felix H. Arion & Iulia C. Muresan & Bianca M. Bordeanu, 2017. "Consumers’ Attitudes towards Organic Products and Sustainable Development: A Case Study of Romania," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(9), pages 1-14, September.
    2. Bryła Paweł, 2017. "Creating and Delivering Value for Consumers of Healthy Food – a Case Study of Organic Farma Zdrowia S.A," Journal of Management and Business Administration. Central Europe, Sciendo, vol. 25(4), pages 55-74, December.
    3. Malkanthi, S.H. Pushpa & Rathnachandra, S.D. Dilini & Weerasinghe, W.A. Ruwani N., . "Consumers’ Awareness on Organic Food: Case of Urban Sri Lanka," Problems of World Agriculture / Problemy Rolnictwa Światowego, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, vol. 21(4).
    4. Safdar Muhammad & Eihab Fathelrahman & Rafi Ullah Tasbih Ullah, 2017. "Erratum: Muhammad, S.; Fathelrahman, E.; Tasbih Ullah, R.U. The Significance of Consumer’s Awareness about Organic Food Products in the United Arab Emirates. Sustainability 2016, 8 , 833," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-1, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Malin Jonell & Beatrice Crona & Kelsey Brown & Patrik Rönnbäck & Max Troell, 2016. "Eco-Labeled Seafood: Determinants for (Blue) Green Consumption," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(9), pages 1-19, September.
    2. Haesun Park-Poaps & Tae-Im Han, 2025. "The Roles of Perceived Threat, Organic Trust, and Consumer Effectiveness in Organic Consumption Across Different Organic Products," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-15, March.
    3. Giovanna Piracci & Emilia Lamonaca & Fabio Gaetano Santeramo & Fabio Boncinelli & Leonardo Casini, 2024. "On the willingness to pay for food sustainability labelling: A meta‐analysis," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 55(2), pages 329-345, March.
    4. Vlaeminck, Pieter & Jiang, Ting & Vranken, Liesbet, 2014. "How can environmental information align consumer behaviour with attitude? Evidence from a field experiment," Working Papers 162425, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Centre for Agricultural and Food Economics.
    5. Hoi Quoc Le & Thi Minh Nguyen, 2018. "Behaviors in the market for safe vegetables under information asymmetry: modeling approach," Eurasian Economic Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 8(3), pages 381-392, December.
    6. Samson Yaekob Assele & Michel Meulders & Helena Michiels & Nanou Flamant & Martina Vandebroek, 2023. "The Effect of Information Provision and Color Coding in Product Labeling on the Preference for Meat Substitutes," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(22), pages 1-20, November.
    7. Charalampia N. Anastasiou & Kiriaki M. Keramitsoglou & Nikos Kalogeras & Maria I. Tsagkaraki & Ioanna Kalatzi & Konstantinos P. Tsagarakis, 2017. "Can the “Euro-Leaf” Logo Affect Consumers’ Willingness-To-Buy and Willingness-To-Pay for Organic Food and Attract Consumers’ Preferences? An Empirical Study in Greece," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(8), pages 1-17, August.
    8. Jessica Aschemann-Witzel & Stephan Zielke, 2017. "Can't Buy Me Green? A Review of Consumer Perceptions of and Behavior Toward the Price of Organic Food," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(1), pages 211-251, March.
    9. Goedele Van den Broeck & Kaat Van Hoyweghen & Miet Maertens, 2016. "Employment Conditions in the Senegalese Horticultural Export Industry: A Worker Perspective," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 34(2), pages 301-319, March.
    10. Jianying Xiao & Qian Wang & Jinjin Dai & Bin Yang & Long Li, 2023. "Urban Residents’ Green Agro-Food Consumption: Perceived Risk, Decision Behaviors, and Policy Implications in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(13), pages 1-17, July.
    11. McFadden, Jonathan R. & Huffman, Wallace E., 2017. "Willingness-to-pay for natural, organic, and conventional foods: The effects of information and meaningful labels," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 214-232.
    12. Takahashi, Ryo & Todo, Yasuyuki & Funaki, Yukihiko, 2018. "How Can We Motivate Consumers to Purchase Certified Forest Coffee? Evidence From a Laboratory Randomized Experiment Using Eye-trackers," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 107-121.
    13. Marietta Kiss & Kontor Eniko & Kun Andras Istvan, 2015. "The Effect Of 'Organic' Labels On Consumer Perception Of Chocolates," Annals of Faculty of Economics, University of Oradea, Faculty of Economics, vol. 1(1), pages 448-457, July.
    14. Yanghao Wang & Metin Çakır, 2020. "Welfare impacts of new demand‐enhancing agricultural products: The case of Honeycrisp apples," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 51(3), pages 445-457, May.
    15. Hugo Ferrer-Pérez & Filippo Arfini & José M. Gil, 2019. "Modelling Price Transmission within the Supply Chain under a European Protected Designation of Origin Framework: The Case of Parmigiano Reggiano in Italy," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-13, March.
    16. Wu, Linhai & Wang, Shuxian & Zhu, Dian & Hu, Wuyang & Wang, Hongsha, 2015. "Chinese consumers’ preferences and willingness to pay for traceable food quality and safety attributes: The case of pork," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 121-136.
    17. Li, Tongzhe & Fooks, Jacob & Messer, Kent D., "undated". "Residents’ Preferences in Adopting Water Runoff Management Practices: Examining the Effect of Behavioral Nudges in a Field Experiment," 2017 Annual Meeting, July 30-August 1, Chicago, Illinois 259127, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    18. Vlaeminck, Pieter & Vranken, Liesbet, 2015. "Do labels capture consumers’ actual willingness to pay for Fair Trade characteristics?," Working Papers 206438, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Centre for Agricultural and Food Economics.
    19. Hanna Górska-Warsewicz & Sylwia Żakowska-Biemans & Maksymilian Czeczotko & Monika Świątkowska & Dagmara Stangierska & Ewa Świstak & Agnieszka Bobola & Julita Szlachciuk & Karol Krajewski, 2018. "Organic Private Labels as Sources of Competitive Advantage—The Case of International Retailers Operating on the Polish Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-28, July.
    20. Deely, John & Hynes, Stephen & Barquín, José & Burgess, Diane & Álvarez-Martínez, Jose Manuel & Silió, Ana & Finney, Graham, 2022. "Are consumers willing to pay for beef that has been produced without the use of uncontrolled burning methods? A contingent valuation study in North-West Spain," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 577-590.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:ijofsd:198918. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/centmde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.