PurposeThis paper aims to synthesize the literature on consumer preferences for farm animal welfare (FAW), with an emphasis on characterizing consumers based on their FAW preferences. The objective is to provide insights into the salient characteristics associated with animal welfare conscious consumers.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conduct a systematic review of the results of published research on consumer preferences for FAW. Approximately 350 papers were reviewed, and 52 were included in the analysis.FindingsThe authors’ review suggests that consumers are not homogenous in their preferences for FAW. The authors identify seven themes that enabled them to characterize consumers with higher FAW preferences. These themes (i.e. age, education and income, gender, country and cross-cultural differences, attitudes and consumer and citizen functions) are grouped under four main headings (socio-demographics, ethics and attitudes, product characteristics and public roles).Research limitations/implicationsThe authors’ synthesis reflects the findings reported in the literature to this date; the identified characteristics may change with time as new evidence becomes available.Practical implicationsThe information collected in this article would be useful to farmers and food and non-food retailers interested in effective product differentiation and marketing strategies regarding FAW standards. It can also inform policymakers about the state of consumer concerns for FAW.Originality/valueTo the best of authors' knowledge, this is the first study that attempts to develop a systematic profile of consumers based on their FAW preferences.

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Food integrity and food technologies both generate public concerns. There is little research to show the interactions between those concerns in particular samples, especially in Canada. In this paper, data from two national online samples are used to examine an aggregate of food integrity concerns, genetic modification in food, and food nanotechnology concerns in the Canadian public. A variety of trust, health, environmental, and science attitude variables are used to help explain the concerns that vary across the population. In addition, the food integrity concerns are tested as explanatory variables in the technology concern models to establish whether there is a strong or weak link between the two. Tobit and ordered probit regressions are used to model the variables for each of the survey samples. Results are examined to see if they are consistent across surveys and also consistent with an earlier study that was done in Australia. The results suggest that trust in people and trust in a variety of agents within the food system are beliefs that ameliorate concerns about food integrity and the two technologies. However, trust in advocacy organizations appears to be related to higher concerns in each case. Fundamentally and similar to the earlier Australian study, positive scientific attitudes are a major determinant of reduced concerns about food integrity and the two technologies.

This paper proposes the application of hierarchical models to the assessment of feed efficiency in beef cattle. Using a large dataset comprising 5600 cattle assembled from different experimental studies, feed efficiency rankings of cattle were estimated using the proposed approach. This was compared to more commonly used linear, and nonlinear estimators. A phenotypic selection scheme that selects cattle at the means of different percentiles was developed to illustrate potential economic and environmental outcomes resulting from changes in feed efficiency rankings. The former involved the specification of a multi-year stochastic farm simulation model. In general, our results show that improved feed efficiency is associated with positive economic and environmental benefits. A unit reduction in feed intake (kg as fed/day) is associated with an average increase of $13.23 in net returns and 33.46 tonnes reduction in emission at the end of the feeding period. We also find that feed efficiency ranking of cattle is sensitive to estimation approach. The within percentile mean estimates of the hierarchical model were comparable to the conventional linear estimator. There were, however, deviations at the tails of feed efficiency distributions where selection is most likely to occur.

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