Changes in Consumers’ Food Purchase and Transport Behaviors over a Decade (2010 to 2019) Following Health and Convenience Food Trends

Tae Jin Cho, Sun Ae Kim, Hye Won Kim, Sun Min Park and Min Suk Rhee
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Tae Jin Cho: Department of Food and Biotechnology, College of Science and Technology, Korea University, Sejong 30019, Korea
Sun Ae Kim: Department of Food Science and Engineering, Ewha Womans University, Seoul 03760, Korea
Hye Won Kim: Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea
Sun Min Park: Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea
Min Suk Rhee: Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Korea University, Seoul 02841, Korea

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 15, 1-14

Abstract: Although consumers’ food purchase/transport have been reported as causes of food safety risks, there is a lack of empirical data that are feasible to identify persistent and emerging risky behaviors of consumers. This longitudinal trend study consists of individual consumer surveys in 2010 ( n = 609) and 2019 ( n = 605) to analyze changes in risky behaviors linked to food purchase/transport over a decade. Overall, the results identified purchase/transport time and purchase order as the emerging and unchanged risk factors, respectively. Consumers’ preferences into channels for purchase (large discount stores rather than small/traditional markets) and transport (using cars or delivery) implied the convenience as the noticeable trend. Whereas, unexpected increases in purchase/transport time highlighted the underestimated risks in long-term exposure of foods under inadequate temperature. Food should not be exposed to danger zones > 1–2 h, but consumers might be unaware of the risk especially for preferred channels (e.g., 77 and 36 min. are required for purchase and transport from large discount stores, respectively). In the case of unchanged risky behavior, more than half of consumers in both surveys did not follow proper purchasing orders. Our findings highlight the necessity for novel countermeasures and the improvement of current consumer guidelines against emerging and unchanged risky behaviors, respectively.

Keywords: consumer survey; food trend; food preparation behavior; food purchase/transport time; risk perception; healthy food consumption; cultural consumer context; food safety; convenience; microbiological risk (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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