Search results

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate recent changes made by Australian consumers in their consumption of beef, chicken, pork and lamb, as well as the factors motivating both decreased and increased consumption of each type of meat. Reasons for meat-avoidance are also examined.

An online questionnaire was completed in July 2016 by two Australian samples comprising: adults from the general population; and vegetarians. Data were analysed for 287 meat consumers and 82 meat avoiders. Descriptive statistics and results of multinomial logistic regression models are presented.

Meat consumers most commonly reported reducing consumption of beef in the last 12 months (30 per cent); followed by lamb (22 per cent), pork (14 per cent) and chicken (8 per cent). The following factors were associated with reductions in meat consumption: concerns regarding price and personal health; age and household income; and food choice motivations related to personal benefits, social factors and food production and origin. Main reasons motivating meat-avoidance were concerns regarding animal welfare, health and environmental protection.

This is the first Australian study providing national-level insight on how and why meat consumption patterns are changing. Reasons for changes are examined through an anti-consumption lens, investigating rationale for avoiding, reducing and increasing consumption. This provides a more comprehensive understanding of meat consumption and anti-consumption decisions, which are becoming increasingly complex. Insights on the psychologically distinct motivations underpinning avoidance, reductions and increases in meat consumption can inform the development of strategies aimed at promoting a societal-shift towards consumption of more sustainable dietary protein sources.

The purpose of this study is to assess the differences in individual purchasing and voting decisions for livestock products, produced with lower levels of antibiotic use or higher levels of environmental sustainability, by consumers with different degrees of agreement with moral foundation statements.

Data are collected from two national online surveys that were conducted in Canada in 2016 and 2017, including socio-demographic, attitude, belief and stated choice questions. Data are analysed using hierarchical cluster analysis and ordered probit regressions.

Respondents who strongly agree with the individualizing moral foundation statements are more likely to buy more environmentally sustainable milk/yogurt and pork from pigs that are raised with reduced antibiotic use, as compared to respondents who have weaker agreement with the statements. Respondents with stronger agreement with the moral foundation statements are also more likely to vote in favour of stricter livestock environmental standards and disease protocols.

Monitoring people’s moral concerns might help in predicting consumers’ responses to new or different production practices.

Although moral foundations have been linked to other purchase decisions, in this study, the focus is on specific aspects of environmental sustainability and antibiotic use in livestock production. Both of these challenging issues are controversial and facing either regulatory changes (antibiotic use in livestock) or significant livestock production changes (responding to concerns that livestock production is less sustainable than plant production) in most developed countries. Understanding the linkages between fundamental beliefs and probable consumer behaviour will assist in predicting negative or positive outcomes to the regulatory or industry-based changes to livestock production. Differences between an individual’s desire to be able to identify products with certain attributes for purchase vs an individual’s desire to have government regulate industries to higher standards, in both contexts, will also be linked to the individual’s level of moral foundation beliefs.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how individual’s health beliefs, nutrition knowledge (NK) and attitudes towards food technologies play a role in the anti-consumption of dairy products or the consumption of dairy alternatives.

Self-reported data concerning the consumption of milk, yogurt and dairy products in general were collected online among 1,705 adults in Canada. Also included in the survey instrument were measures of NK and health beliefs as well as questions from the food technology neophobia scale. Anti-consumption of milk, yogurt and dairy as well as alternative dairy consumption as a function of these characteristics, in addition to demographic characteristics, is analysed using probit models.

Individuals who demonstrate resistance to innovations in food technology, those with lower levels of dairy-specific NK, and people who have less belief that dairy avoidance will have negative impacts on their health are more likely to be anti-consumers of milk and/or yogurt. The same is true for dairy products in general with the exception that people with higher levels of dairy-specific NK are more likely to be anti-consumers of dairy products in general.

Inadequate intake of calcium and vitamin D has negative consequences for long-term health. Given that dairy products are the primary source of these nutrients in the Canadian diet, it is important to understand the reasons behind dairy anti-consumption so that appropriate policy measures can be taken to address potential public health issues.

This paper examines the cost structure and cost efficiency for an unbalanced sample of 42 animal feed and 115 farm petroleum co‐operatives in Canada over the period 1984‐2001 using heterogeneous technology stochastic frontier models. The parameter estimates of the cost frontier and the resulting cost efficiency scores indicate there are statistically and economically significant cost inefficiencies. Further analysis revealed that financial structure and firm size have likely contributed to variations in cost efficiency. Obtaining sufficient equity capital is expected to improve co‐operative efficiency

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate cow-calf producer incentive to adopt innovations in traits with important environmental and economic implications for the beef supply chain.

A whole farm multi-year farm optimization model that tracks changes in discounted net returns and methane emissions from the use of newer DNA-related technologies to breed for feed efficient cattle is developed. The analysis is situated within the context of whole beef cattle supply chain. This allows for the derivation of the entire value and environmental impact of the innovation, and the decomposition of value by different participants. The impact of different policies that can stimulate producer uptake and the diffusion of the innovation is also addressed.

The results of the study showed that whilst the use of the breeding technology yielded positive economic and environmental benefits to all producers in the supply chain, primary adopters were unlikely to adopt. This paper finds evidence of the misalignment in incentives within the supply chain with a significant proportion of the additional value going to producers who do not incur any additional cost from the adoption of the innovation. The study also highlighted the role of both public and market-based mechanisms in the innovation diffusion process.

This paper is unique as it is the first study that addresses producer incentive to adopt genomic selection for feed efficiency across the entire beef cattle supply chain, and incorporates both economic and environmental outcomes.

In Canada, grain handling is an important agri-business that has traditionally been cooperative in nature (for example, Saskatchewan Wheat Pool). At the same time the industry is heavily regulated. There has been a dramatic change in the structure of the industry over the past 20 years and there are currently no major cooperatives present in the market. If the “yardstick effect” hypothesis of the role of cooperatives in an imperfectly competitive market is true, the disappearance of cooperatives could result in the ability of remaining firms to exercise market power over producers. To investigate the impact of changes in ownership structure in the market, we estimated two types of pricing games that might have been played between a cooperative, Saskatchewan Wheat Pool (SWP) and an investor-owned firm (IOF), Pioneer Grain (PG) in the Saskatchewan wheat-handling market over the period 1980–2004, with different assumptions about their pricing behavior imposed. We find that SWP and PG have likely been playing a Bertrand pricing game in the market over the period. We thus conclude that SWP, as the largest cooperative in the market, likely played a “yardstick effect” role in the market.

The agribusiness co-operative sector in Canada has been affected by ongoing changes in economic, political, and social policies. Increased competition from local investor-owned firms and multinational companies, deregulation and globalization of trade and increased concentration of suppliers and purchasers have put tremendous competitive pressure on agribusiness marketing co-operatives. The enhanced level of competitive rivalry may force co-operatives into lowering costs and prices. Improvement in cost or operating efficiency of agribusiness marketing co-operatives may be crucial as changes in regulation, technology, and other market developments bring into question the long-term viability of co-operative businesses. Therefore, information as to the efficiency with which agribusiness co-operative firms operate would be useful.