Factors influencing Swedish consumersbuying of organic products: With the participation of the company Wästgötarna
2014 (English)Independent thesis Basic level (degree of Bachelor), 10 credits / 15 HE credits
Student thesis
Abstract [en]
A product can be labeled organic if it respects the rules from policies of specialized organisms. Nowadays, more and more individuals consume organic food for diverse reasons. In Sweden, people are concerned about this topic, and seek to improve their habits. Several studies have shown different aspects regarding the perception of the organic concept through demography, attitudes and values factors. Those studies remained general and did not focus their analysis on a country like Sweden. Thus, it will be interesting to investigate the subject, to understand and to analyze which factors influence the Swedish population to buy organic food in order to help the local farming producers to be aware of their target and to focus their strategies on consumers. Thus, we would like to examine the relationship between the individual characteristics of consumers and the motivations toward the organic food purchase, in Sweden. Through a quantitative method, and the creation of a survey, we would like to determine what kind of consumers they are and, what criteria explain their choices. From the theoretical framework, we had some theories that help us to analyze our findings. Indeed, different Green behaviors exist taking into account the quality, the environmental factor, the health reasons, the local production and the food safety. In order to have an overview of the Swedish consumer, we collaborated with a local cooperative, Wästgötarna. We surveyed 30 people who consume Wästgötarna's products. It drives us to the study of this survey through an in-depth analysis of univariate, bivariate and multivariate analysis of data by the use of crosstabs. We focused our research on the criteria we found out from the theoretical framework (quality, environmental impact, origin...). Our survey has shown us that women are more concerned by the organic food than men. It is even more obvious when the household gets children. Mostly, consumers, between 25 and 34 y.o. and between 46y.o. and more, buy the more often organic products. These consumers purchase organic products because of Swedish production, health reasons and environmental concerns. However, their knowledge about this field stays low on the benefits of this kind of products. We concluded our thesis with the general overview of Swedish consumers; our respondents seem to appear in the Green consumerism, as humanist people, i.e. they avoid the industrial food to encourage local production. However, due to our small sample size, we cannot generalize the fact but only suggest it
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2014. , p. 60
Keywords [sv]
Organic products, local farming, consumer behavior and Swedish organic consumer.
National Category
Business Administration
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hv:diva-6871Local ID: EXC504OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hv-6871DiVA, id: diva2:756894
Subject / course
Business administration
Supervisors
Examiners
2014-10-202014-10-202015-09-15Bibliographically approved