Importance of traceability for sustainable production: a cross‐country comparison

Abstract

Traceability systems are becoming an important tool for tracking, monitoring and managing product flows through food supply chains. Traceability can be used as a method of certifying production, processing and nutritional credence attributes of food products. Environmentally sustainable production is a credence attribute that is gaining in importance in the eyes of consumers. In this research, the importance of traceability in verifying environmentally sustainable production practices is examined. The data were collected in online surveys related to consumer's perceptions and concerns about food safety, trust and reported behaviour related to meat consumption in three countries – Canada, the US and Japan. Determinants of traceability in verifying environmentally sustainable production practices include respondents' locus of control about food safety, food purchasing characteristics such as whether they normally buy organic products or shop at supermarkets and general traits such as worry and trust. In comparing across countries, there are significant differences in the interests in traceability to verify environmentally sustainable production practices and in the determinants of level of importance ascribed.

Communicating social support during crises at the farmers’ market: A social exchange approach to understanding customer‐farmer communal relationships

“…Farmers must provide customers benefits in return for loyal support, which is consistent with SET (Cropanzano & Mitchell, ; Emerson, ; Roloff, ). Farmers provide access to a food supply that consumers perceive as high quality (Brown, ; Feagan & Morris, ), environmentally friendly (Alkon, ; Garner, ), and healthy (Alonso & O'Neill, ; Brown, ; Myae & Goddard, ). Farmers also provide customized service to loyal customers.…”

“…Farmers’ markets are growing rapidly in the United States (USDA, ), as well as in Canada, the U.K., and New Zealand (Feagan & Morris, ; Guthrie, Guthrie, & Lawson, ). The local food movement and farmers’ markets are a growing niche market in which scholars can and have examined consumer values such as: community and embeddedness (Feagan & Morris, ; Lyson, Gillespie, & Hilchey, ; Robinson & Hartenfeld, ), sustainability and environmentalism (Alkon, ; Garner, ), localism (Hinrichs, ; McEachern, Warnaby, Carrigan, & Szmigin, ), health and product quality (Brown, ; Myae & Goddard, ; Weber, Heinze, & DeSoucey, ), politics (Brenton, ; Pezzullo, ; Pezzullo, ) and especially increased social interaction and interdependence with vendors (Garner, ; Hunt, ; Sommer, Herrick, & Sommer, ; Trobe, ).…”

Consumer Preferences for Traceable Fruit and Vegetables and Their Influencing Factor in Indonesia

“…The results indicated that when a fast food store adopts FTS, consumers' perceived uncertainty can be reduced because both their perceived information asymmetry and fear of seller opportunism also fall, which in turn strengthens their purchase intentions regarding fast foods. In regards to environmental issues, Myae and Goddard [7] discovered which factors influence the degree of importance consumers place on traceability in guaranteeing environmentally sustainable production methods. In a country comparison (Canada, US and Japan), there are significant differences in countries' interests in traceability when verifying environmentally sustainable production practices and in the determinants for level of importance.…”

“…As one to the tools adopted by the food industry to improve food safety, traceability plays an important role because it complies with legislation and it enhances the transparency and safety of the food system through the provisions of transparent trace back and track forward information as well as to boosting consumer confidence [1][3] [7]. In many countries, traceability systems have been introduced as a legal requirement.…”

A secured tag for implementation of traceability in textile and clothing supply chain

“…Supply chain transparency and security have emerged as key concerns for various industries. With growing number of ethical issues and increasing counterfeits, it has become a necessity to make the supply chains more secure and transparent [1][2][3]. Textile and clothing (T&C) supply chain is one such example.…”