Factors Influencing Consumers’ Interest in Protected Designation of Origin Products in Serbia

Abstract

Typical and traditional products are becoming an important element of the agro-food panorama in Serbia. For keeping and, even, fostering this positive trend an effective strategy for the valorisation of these products is necessary. For that it is crucial to have a clear idea about the perception and attitude of consumers. The paper analyses the main factors that affect consumers' interest for purchasing Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) products in Serbia. A field survey -focusing on two PDOs namely Petrovac sausage and Futog cabbagewas performed in the period July-October 2012 with 251 Serbian consumers. The analysis showed that there are perspectives for PDO products in Serbia, as a large proportion of Serbian consumers are positively oriented towards products with designation of origin and would buy them. Interest for PDO products is connected and influenced by interest in typical products, awareness of PDO/Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) scheme, daily eating habits, education and income level. The main influence of these factors is identified for all sample, as well as for three different groups of consumers obtained by cluster analysis; "consumers with strong interest in PDO products" represents 28.7% of the sample, "consumers moderately interested in PDO products" stands at 41.8% of the sample while 29.5% of the interviewees belong to the third group "consumers poorly interested in PDO products". The fact that more than two thirds of respondents are either strongly or moderately interested in PDO products show that Petrovac sausage and Futog cabbage have good perspectives in the Serbian agro-food market.

Do Food Quality Schemes and Net Price Premiums Go Together?

“…Nevertheless, the lowest PP dispersion is observed among organic products, whereas within GI it is very high, especially for PGI. The findings showing a positive price premium are consistent with the results of numerous studies conducted at retail level which exhibit a consumer's willingness to pay (WTP) for organic food (Dimitri and Dettman, 2012;Maigné et al, 2017;Wier et al, 2008), PDO products (Fotopoulos and Krystallis, 2003;Garavaglia and Mariani, 2017;Panin et al, 2015) and PGI products (Ahrendsen and Majewski, 2017). This study demonstrates that this WTP is carried through all the supply chain, with significant PP at upstream and processing level, regardless of product categories.…”