Hedonic Pricing For Prawn and Shrimp in the Philippines

The prawn and shrimp industry in the Philippines is among the most lucrative industries at the domestic and foreign prospective. This paper discusses the relevance of hedonic price analysis recognizing that improving quality is a major issue in the global seafood market due to the increasing consciousness among buyers, who are becoming "quality consumers" rather than "quantity consumers". This paper uses hedonic price model to measure the economic benefits from investing the production of good with preferred quantities of attributes or value-added features. Using primary data based on observed and measured characteristics, we develop a log-linear model with combined continuous and dummy explanation model. The estimation results show significant implicit prices of attributes such as prawn tail length, product form, freshness, species, colour, size, ease of preparation, discolouration, protein and carbohydrate content. Specifically, longer tains and banana species are highly valued. Across sizes, large and average receive price premium. Freezing, although most practiced due to availability of technology and facilities, gets the highest discount among other forms of preservation.