Consumers' view on pork: Consumption motives and production preferences in ten European Union and four non-European Union countries

Abstract

To analyse consumers' attitudes and perceptions towards pork, online surveys were performed with 11,294 consumers from ten European Union (EU) and four non-EU countries. The survey indicates that, although animal welfare affects consumers' view on pork, it is not consumers' primary concern. For most countries, the ranking order of food motives was health and natural, sensory quality, price, and animal welfare. The ranking order for pork production preferences was quality and health, environmental and animal friendliness, regional identity, and production efficiency. A choice experiment, conducted for four countries: Denmark, France, Italy, and Poland, showed that natural was the most important factor, followed by health, taste, animals' pain and stress, costs, and pharmaceutical interventions. Four consumer segments were identified: Demanding, Average, Low-on-eco, and Indifferent. Although the percentage shares of these groups differ in each country, we conclude that consumer consumption motives and production preferences are sufficiently similar to include them as communicative elements in marketing strategies for meat from non-castrated pigs.

Keywords: Boars; Choice experiment; Consumption motives; Immunovaccination; Pig castration; Production preferences.