Sustainability Labels And Consumer Choices
For a variety of reasons, it seems that more people are interested in making positive and meaningful changes to their food choices. One of the most common ways that consumers get information is through food labels. We have covered a wide range of studies related to food labels at Faunalytics, from the use of “multi-level” labels, the impact they have on perceptions of animal welfare, and much more.
But it’s a wild labeling world out there. There are few international standards that regulate product claims of sustainability, for instance. National or regional standards are not any clearer. Further, we don’t know if sustainability labels are effective, or how to make them so. This paper investigates whether consumers take different sustainability labels into account when making buying decisions. The authors then tested how consumers deal with “different labels that are (partly) addressing the same aspect.”
Of particular relevance to animal advocates, the researchers focused on milk. The survey was carried out online with a sample described as representative of the German population. They found that three main types of consumers. First, 48% felt that “labelling of sustainable attributes” was important and they expressed clear preferences for all sustainability labels. Second, 16% of consumers had preferences for certain aspects (such as local or animal-friendly), but not for others (such as organic or CO2-reduced). Third, 36% of consumers said that sustainability aspects and labels did not matter at all.
There is much more for advocates to take in, available in the full article. Even this summary shows that sustainability labeling is a complex matter. For some consumers, labels are an important aspect of food-related decision-making. For others, it may matter only in certain contexts or for certain products (or not at all). Advocates rarely have the power to influence food labeling, but we can educate ourselves and others about the meaning and influence of existing and new labels.