Drinking biodiversity: a choice experiment on Franciacorta sparkling wines

Abstract

PurposeConsumers' concerns about the environmental impacts of food production have been increasing over the last years, and several certification systems for environment-friendly food products have been created. This research investigates wine consumers' preferences for a certification that guarantees the use of agricultural practices that better protect the biodiversity in the vineyard during the production of grapes.Design/methodology/approachUsing a choice experiment, we investigate consumer preferences and willingness to pay for biodiversity-friendly wines on a sample of 334 wine consumers. The experiment was carried out by direct interviews at a wine-tasting event in an Italian winery located in the Franciacorta area, in northern Italy. A between-subject design and two different questionnaires were used, one presenting the Brut bottle and one the Satén bottle.FindingsEstimates from a mixed logit model reveal that consumers are generally willing to pay a higher price for biodiversity-friendly wines, but they have stronger preferences for organic certification and quality indications. When consumers perceive a specific product as having high quality, i.e. Satèn, they might be less willing to pay for further environment-friendly certifications. Moreover, preferences depend on sociodemographic and attitudinal variables such as gender, wine consumption frequency, wine education and knowledge degree of the labels.Originality/valueThis paper broadens the knowledge about consumer preferences and willingness to pay for biodiversity-friendly wines, focusing on a specific market segment of Italian sparkling wines.

Consumers’ Attitudes for Sustainable Mountain Cheese

“…In particular, sustainable labels refer to environmental, ethical and social issues [19] embracing all these contexts and influencing consumers' behavior. CEs have been hugely employed for investigating consumers' behavior in purchasing choice, assessing the Willingness to Pay (WTP) for a given asset and for valuing the consumer's preferred characteristics of food products [1]. By means of this methodological approach, several researches have been realized to investigate consumers' food preferences for environmental labels, ethical-related issues, and social certifications.…”

“…Environmental-friendly labels literature based on CEs approach includes a huge number of studies related to the numerous certifications in the food market; among them, the water-saving production certification [20], carbon footprint label (CF) [21][22][23][24], biodiversity label [18], and the most famous organic label [1,[25][26][27].…”

“…Among environment-friendly food labels studies, the issue of biodiversity is rarely proposed, because to our knowledge, a label does not yet exist; but some authors [1,18] have employed CEs to investigate the consumers' WTP for wines with a hypothetical certification of agricultural practices protecting biodiversity in the vineyard, assessing a consumer's willingness to pay both for low-cost and in high-cost wines.…”

“…In the last twenty years, food consumers have become more and more interested in the sustainability of food production [1], food process and food sales [2]. Recent food scandals (i.e., mad cow, swine disease) have contributed to raising consumers' awareness about food production.…”

“…The shift towards more sustainable consumptions and habits have had tangible impacts on the food market, which has accepted this challenge by offering a variety of certification systems to pull consumers aside, in order to satisfy their desire of sustainable food [9]. According to Ruggeri [1], certification labels foster the market diffusion of typical food products, improving the territorial development and supporting sustainable producers. Although food certifications focused on sustainability usually help consumers in their purchasing actions, food purchasing choices are also guided by ethical, environmental and cultural motivations, functioning as drivers of food acquiring [10].…”