Peer effects in the valuation and practices of food safety: findings from the study of dairy consumers in India

Raj Chandra, Abdul Munasib, Devesh Roy and Vinay K. Sonkar

Indian Growth and Development Review, 2021, vol. 14, issue 2, 223-241

Abstract: Purpose - Information is often available to consumers through their social networks. Focusing on dairy consumers in India, this paper aims to present evidence of peer effects in consumers’ attitudes towards various food safety attributes and food safety practices. Design/methodology/approach - Unobserved individual heterogeneities are crucial confounders in the identification of social (endogenous) effects. The identification is based on exploiting within-consumer variation across different aspects of attitude (or practices) related to food safety. Findings - This paper uses a novel identification strategy that allows for average effects across attributes and practices to be estimated. Using the strategy, though this paper cannot estimate endogenous effects in each attribute or practice, this paper is able to identify such effects averaged over attributes or practices. Research limitations/implications - Cross-sectional study, caste affiliation is not defined at the right level of granularity. Practical implications - The results suggest that information campaigns aimed at creating awareness about food safety can have social multiplier effects, and this also translates into changes in the practices followed to mitigate food safety risks. Social implications - In health-related awareness and practices, there are well-established cases of multiplier effects. The most significant example of this is the Pulse Polio campaign in India, where an awareness drives through social multiplier effects had such a significant impact that in 2012 India was declared polio-free. Perhaps, a similar campaign in matters related to food safety could be very fruitful. Originality/value - The methodology and the issue are unique. Little exists in assessing social networks in the context of food safety.

Keywords: Unobserved heterogeneity; Food safety (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:igdrpp:igdr-06-2019-0059

DOI: 10.1108/IGDR-06-2019-0059

Access Statistics for this article

Indian Growth and Development Review is currently edited by Professor Chetan Ghate, Professor Prabal Chowdhury and Professor Prabal Chowdhury

More articles in Indian Growth and Development Review from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().