Study on Consumer Preference for Traceable Pork With Animal Welfare Attribute

Chen, Mo; Hu, Enhua; Kuen, Lin Lin; Wu, Linhai

We determined consumer preferences for traceable pork attributes in 328 consumers in Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province, China, based on a traceable pork attribute system composed of traceability, animal welfare, place of origin, and price attributes. Preference was studied using a Choice Experiment and Bayesian inference analysis. Results showed that the marginal utility of health welfare was lower than that of high-level traceability information and similar to that of place of origin but was higher than that of middle-level traceability information. A complementary relationship existed between dietary animal welfare and high-level traceability information and between health welfare and non-indigenous production. A substitution relationship existed between health welfare and indigenous production and between environmental animal welfare and non-indigenous production. The marginal utilities of health welfare and dietary welfare were higher than those of all price levels, and consumers accept a higher price as a result of increased production costs due to the inclusion of animal welfare information. Due to the harsh realities of COVID-19, China has recently approved the animal welfare attribute to be integrated into traceability market systems of new animal-derived food. The government should encourage manufacturers to produce diverse traceable animal-derived food not only to protect animal welfare and promote the construction of an ecological civilization, but also to develop new animal-derived food markets to satisfy different levels of consumer demand.