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Research article2022Peer reviewedOpen access

Consumer perceptions and attitudes towards climate information on food

Edenbrandt, Anna Kristina; Lagerkvist, Carl -Johan

Abstract

The food sector is a major contributor to climate change, and reducing meat consumption is important to achieve significant reductions in global carbon emissions. The implementation of information policies to reduce carbon emissions from red meat consumption entails understanding of how such information is expected to be received and used by consumers. This study uses survey data from a consumer panel, and match this with data on the same respondents' actual purchase behavior based on scanner data. Individuals with lower knowledge levels about the climate impact from food purchase the highest share of red meat, and the lowest share of sustainability labelled products. This indicates that information provision has the potential to increase knowledge among in-dividuals with the highest climate impact. Four sub-groups of consumers are identified in a latent class cluster model based on their motivations for consuming or avoiding meat. It is mainly the 'meat reducers' and 'meat avoiders' that are interested in using climate information when purchasing food. However, individuals in these sub-groups already purchase the least amount of meat and the highest amount of sustainable products. These findings point to limitations with climate information as a policy instrument, and suggests that other measures are needed as complements to initiate and achieve the necessary changes in consumption patterns.

Keywords

Climate information; Purchase behavior; Meat consumption; Consumer attitudes

Published in

Journal of Cleaner Production
2022, Volume: 370, article number: 133441
Publisher: ELSEVIER SCI LTD

      SLU Authors

      • Sustainable Development Goals

      Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts
      Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns

      UKÄ Subject classification

      Climate Research
      Applied Psychology

      Publication identifier

      DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.133441

      Permanent link to this page (URI)

      https://res.slu.se/id/publ/119245