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Canadian Consumer Preference and Willingness to Pay for Beef Raised under Different Antimicrobial Use Practices
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- Author / Creator
- Olufemi, Michael O
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In recent years, there have been rising public concerns regarding production practices related to antimicrobial use (AMU) in food-animal production (FAP). Many FAP practices have requirements that consumers are not fully aware of. The raised without antibiotics (RWA) requires that no antibiotic be given at any FAP stage. Otherwise, products cannot be labelled as RWA. Consumers are unaware of the negative implications of limiting AMU on animal welfare. This lack of awareness, if unaddressed, may compromise the welfare of FAP. Likewise, the animal welfare-approved (AWA) label has AMU and no-added hormone (NAH) requirements, while the organic label has AMU and animal welfare requirements. Since these practices have related requirements, we want to know if providing consumers with information on the requirements of these practices influences consumer perception and willingness to pay (WTP) for these labels. We conducted a survey using a choice experiment to estimate Canadian consumer preferences and WTP for steak and ground beef with different AMU and animal welfare practices. We estimated consumer WTP for AWA, grass-fed, RWA, raised without medically important antimicrobials (RWMIA), responsible antimicrobial use (RAU), organic, and NAH. We assessed the impact of demographic variables on consumer WTP for these two beef products. Finally, we looked into the effect of information provision about the labelling requirements of these FAP practices on consumer WTP for these beef products. We found that consumers are willing to pay positive premiums for all steak and ground beef labels except RAU. Several demographic variables such as age, income, household size, living in rural areas, farming background, and presence of children under 12 years of age have a negative impact on consumer WTP for labels such as AWA, grass-fed, RWMIA, and organic. The effect of information was generally negative when consumers were provided with labelling requirements of the FAP practices.
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- Graduation date
- Fall 2024
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- Type of Item
- Thesis
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- Degree
- Master of Science
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- License
- This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Library with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.