Consumers and animal welfare: a comparative European analysis.
Our group of social scientists examines existing knowledge on consumer beliefs, concerns, expectations, and use of information on animal friendliness, with particular emphasis on product labelling across six European countries. The country reviews reveal that there are few existing food labels regarding animal welfare and few studies that directly focus on consumer beliefs, concerns and expectations related to this issue. It is evident that factors like age, gender, social class and education matter for mobilisation referring to animal welfare as well as eating patterns. However, such differences alone are probably not sufficient to explain variations between countries or temporal shifts. Different institutional contexts (i.e. market structure, regulatory framework and collective consumer mobilisation) seem to be very important factors in explaining country differences.
In general, awareness about animal welfare seems to have increased since the early 1990s. An important awakening factor has been the various scandals involving the meat sector and debates in the mass media, followed up by an increasing amount of legislation to improve the welfare of farm animals within the EU. However, social mobilisation is most often reflected in more traditional political activities, such as a growing support of animal rights/welfare groups. Consumer concerns have not yet generated a new and significant demand, except perhaps in the UK.
The awareness has, however, been accompanied by more people being sceptical towards their own meat consumption. Scepticism may be reflected in changes in demand, but not always and in all cases. Consumption statistics show significant drops following the BSE crisis in Italy, France and Britain, particularly for beef. The consumption of beef has for the most part been restored. On the other hand, even though increasing concerns were observed even in countries like Sweden, the Netherlands and Norway, there were no clear drops in demand. Comparative studies indicate that trust in actors in the food sector may at least partly explain these differences.
Changes in demand after the BSE crisis illustrate how short-term shifts do not necessarily translate into long-term trends. Many studies have observed that habits are not easily changed, eating and shopping for food are subject to considerable routinization, and processes of change take considerable time and will be influenced by a number of factors. There are strong sets of norms and values attached to the relations between humans and animals, such as limits regarding what is considered edible, which vary across time and culture.
National variations regarding public concerns as reflected in consumer practices must also be seen in the light of each country’s social distribution of responsibility for animal welfare. Many people do not see animal welfare in food production mainly as their responsibility in their role as consumers. Food provisioning systems are highly variable structures and influence the supply of animal friendly food products. Such differences will affect the actual availability and price of such products, information about them, as well as trust relations and notions of responsibility. It seems obvious that when the Swedish and Norwegians hold the government responsible (and trusts it to take on this responsibility) for supervising and regulating the agricultural sector, this will influence the way they see their own responsibility. The UK, with significantly more market based animal welfare programmes and labels, combined with a consumer role focussing more on active individual shoppers, presents a very different situation for handling animal welfare within a market context. The Italian case provides a third position, where the market structure and the distribution of responsibilities are much more fragmented and unclear, and where institutional actors - public authorities and supermarkets - are not highly trusted.
Ingrid Kjørstad and Unni Kjærnes
The National Institute for Consumer Research, Norway
