Organic food between consumers' interest and indifference

The purpose of this paper was to identify several of consumers’ perceptions, beliefs
and actions related to organic food and also possible differences between groups of
consumers. The studied variables were: interest or indifference in eating organic vs
conventional food, food label information reading behaviour, perceived healthiness
degree of organic food, perceived seriousness of the preference for organic food.
The study revealed: an average concern for the food type (organic vs conventional:
57% of the sample declare they care what kind of food they eat); a high interest in
label information (76% declared they read the food label in at least 26% of the
cases when they buy food); dominant perception of organic food as a healthier
option than conventional food (by 95% of the tested consumers) and as opposite to
a fad (by 62% of the subjects); a statistically significant difference between men
and women in terms of their appreciations (perceptions) of organic food as being
healthier than conventional food (p=.036); a statistically significant difference
between people who cared if they ate organic vs conventional food and those who
didn’t care in the levels of label reading frequency (p=.000).