Influences on purchase intentions of organic food consumers in an emerging economy

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the determinants of organic food buying behaviour in an emerging economy like India, where organic food yet has low market share in spite of its potential. Using the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) as the underlying basis, it attempts to explain the effect of attitude, subjective norms and the perceived behaviour control (PBC) on buying intention towards organic food among respondents in Delhi-National capital region, India. Additionally, it attempts to discriminate functional and constructive attitudes. Design/methodology/approach A quantitative questionnaire survey approach was used on 306 respondents and multiple linear regression was used to validate the research model. Findings Attitudes and PBC have a significant positive impact on the intention to purchase organic food. This paper found subjective norms to be weak and barely significant to intention. The results conclude that health motives, past purchase behaviour, knowledge, affordability and trust in organic certification label are the main facilitators in organic food purchase. Primarily, the respondents see buying organic food regularly as being of value and enjoyable to them. A more favourable appearance vs conventional food was negatively related to behavioural intention. Originality/value This research could aid all stakeholders in the organic food sector, particularly emerging economies like India where the organic market is still nascent. It could be an essential driver to improve customer involvement and thus aid them in the decision-making process to choose organic food over conventional food. It also attempts to establish the usability of TPB in assessing functional attitudes based on constructive attitudes for organic food purchase.

Consumer buying behaviour and purchase intention of organic food: a conceptual framework

“…Consumers are attracted to organic food because it is perceived to be safe, healthy and environmental-friendly (Tran, 2017; Janssen, 2018; Dangi et al , 2020). Yet often this interest is not translated into a purchase (Schäufele and Hamm, 2018; Sultan et al , 2019; Aitken et al , 2020).…”

“…Focus in most studies has been on the correlation between corresponding attitude and behaviour for green food choices (Lockie et al , 2004; Tarkiainen and Sundqvist, 2005; Tung et al , 2012; Zhou et al , 2013; Aslihan Nasir and Karakaya, 2014). However, there are a few issues that need further deliberation, as there are inconsistencies among different categories of factors like socio-demographic, consumer psychographics, product and supply related that impact consumer behaviour, including ethical issues in consumer attitude besides environmental and health issues (Nasir and Karakaya, 2014; Schäufele and Hamm, 2018; Dangi et al , 2020).…”

Understanding how to increase hydroponic attractiveness: Economic and ecological benefit

“…By self-administered online questionnaires, 981 respondents were selected by purposive sampling, with criteria they know hydroponic vegetables and have not purchased it yet. The questionnaire is developed by conducting a literature review and adaptation from previous research.There are 38 items in questionnaires to measure ten constructs that consist of 4 items of attitude [25,30,39], 3 items of subjective norm [6,25,30,39], 3 items of perceived behavioral control [25,30,39], 3 items of price [29], 6 items of perceived quality [32], 5 items of knowledge [6,29,39], 4 items of health consciousness [29,39], 3 items of availability [29], 3 items of environmental concerns [25,32], and 4 items of purchase intentions [6,30,32]. Then, we conduct multiple regression to test the hypothesis and K-means cluster analysis to identify respondents' profiles based on ten constructs.…”

“…When someone considers green food, consumers concern about pollution and ecological knowledge, these environmental products were expensive, so customers feel unfair and influence willingness to pay [4]. Considering sustainable food consumption, more consumers change their choice to address environmental issues: organic food [5][6][7]. Premium price-as economic factor is one of the challenges of organic food because it could lower repeat purchases [8].…”

“…Organic food's popularity drives many researchers to study organic food, particularly identifying the antecedents that influence consumers' responses [3,4,6,19]. However, The study about consumer response to hydroponic vegetables is still limited.…”