Consumers More Curious than Ever About How and Where Food is Produced

The Director of the Center for Food Integrity says more than ever consumers are curious about how and where their food is produced.“Trends and developments in consumer perceptions of modern pork production and implications for farmers” was the topic of the keynote address yesterday at Manitoba Pork's 2023 Annual General Meeting.

Amy te Plate-Church, the Director of the U.S. based Center for Food Integrity, says consumers are more curious today than they've ever been about where food is produced and the factors they consider when making purchasing decisions are changing.

Clip-Amy te Plate-Church-Center for Food Integrity:

Historically the big three factors have been price, quality and health and nutrition and  that remains true today but today there are more other factors that are weighing into the choices that consumers make.

That includes convenience but it also includes the social considerations around food production. Can I trust that the animals that produced this food were well cared for, are the farmers utilizing environmentally friendly practices, is this good social and economic contribution?

People today have so many sources of information so we, as the food industry and farmers, need to be aware of where consumers are and more and more of that is online so social media, online influencers, web sites, having our message in all of those places so consumers can find answers to the questions that they have when they have those answers.

Also, consumers are highly dependent on what they see on the packaging or in the store as they're making that decision.As far as trusted sources of  information, farmers are highly trusted.

They're respected by the public for the hard work that they do so it's important to be sharing what they're doing and why they're doing what they do on the farm.

Te Plate-Church says north or south of the border farmers are salt of the earth folks who are working hard to produce food in a responsible way and make sure we have food for consumers around the world.