consumption of organic food in China

Yuhui Qiao

China Agricultural University2014.11.16

1. The status and development trend 2013

Rank 5th of the world (37.5million ha in the world) 0.95% of national agricultural cultivated area

Valid Certificates

Certified Enterprises

Organic area [Mio ha]

Wild Collection [Mio ha]

9957 6051 1.287 1.435

2. The market and trade

The output value:81.68 billion RMB, by the end of

2013

Sales : 200-300 million RMB (30-50 million USD)

the 4th organic food consumption country (US,

Germany, France)

0.29-0.44% of the food consumption market in China

2013The main export market: Europe & America

Organic products market patternMain markets in large cities of：Beijing ， Shanghai, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Chengdu, Shenzhen etc.

Main organic products：Rice, vegetable, grain and oil, meat products, eggs, milk and tea

Main sources：Vegetables from suburb, mainly with home delivery and organic store

Grains and oil mainly from northeast and northwest from supermarkets

Meat and eggs mainly from local products

Tea from southeast area

Milk mainly from Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang

Where to buy organic products?

Supermarkets

organic or healthy food store

Home delivery from farm

Internet

fair

（ Han Zhanbin ， 2012 ）

Consumers awareness of organic products

Food safety Awareness of organic products

Survey in Beijing and Wuhan 519 samples

Organic labeling

Consumers behavior of organic products

Trust on Organic products

（ Han Zhanbin ， 2012 ）

Consumers behavior of organic products

Ways to know organic products

Organic rice Price: 5 times 52% vs 48%

Consumption of organic products

Impact factors to buy organic products

Impact factors Consumers buy difference probability

consumers

Education 13%

Income 20.3%

awareness 11.9%

age 14%

Organic products

Quality 20%

Brand 9%

Access(easy to buy) 13.14%

price 8.4%

（ Zou Weihua et al ， 2009 ）

Target consumers ： medium to high income young peopleOrganic stores: easy to accessProducts: quality and brand are more important

Main problems

Confusion of different safety food concepts

organic food, green food, hazard free food

Low awareness

benefit and how to distinguish

Low trust

bad image from public media, social environment

Ways to solve

Improve the quality and credibility of organic products

Build up trust (more communications like CSA)

Education of consumers to improve their awareness and

how to distinguish

The positive publicity through various media for good

image

THANK YOU