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Organic food demand in Turkey: segmentation from necessity to variety

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Abstract

We aim to reveal organic food consumer profile in terms of sociodemographical characteristics and their preferences including their food consumption choices, knowledge, and information on organic label and environmental awareness and describe the obstacles preventing the growth of organic food sector in Turkey. We conducted a consumer survey in the three largest metropolitan areas in Turkey to describe the characteristics of Turkish organic consumers. The results show that they are mostly more mature, married, having higher income, and do physical activities and they are predominantly concerned about health issues, rather than environment- and food-related preferences, and have limited information on organic. We have produced a graph for Turkish organic food demand using the relative reservation prices that the participants have declared. We can see that this demand is segmented: one part is steeper than the other, and for one segment, organic food is a necessity while for the other it is a variety in the food choice.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Notes

  1. Source: USDA’s Turkish Organic Market Overview (TR6005) Report (2016). USDA also shows that organic packaged food sales have increased by 24% in 2014 and the estimated growth is more than 50% in 2015. It is noteworthy to mention that data on the demand and supply of organic food is very limited in Turkey. Therefore, we have gathered data from different resources in order to chalk out the organic food demand in Turkey.

  2. See for example Cabuk et al. (2014), Akgüngör et al. (2010) and Oraman and Unakıtan (2010).

  3. Source: FAO’s Organic Agriculture: Why is organic food more expensive than conventional food? Report (2018). The report indicates that expensive prices of organic food products rather than their conventional counterparts are due to many reasons such as higher production costs, limited organic food supply due to low organic food demand, other higher costs caused by post-harvesting, distribution channels, transportation, animal welfare and environment protection. See also Lockie et al. 2002; Fotopoulos and Krystallis 2002; Aertsen et al. 2009; Dettmann and Dimitri 2010; Cunningham 2002; **e et al. 2015 on the impact of income.

  4. Hamzoui-Essousi and Zahaf (2008) similarly show that organic labeling is interrelated with consumers’ confidence in organic food. In Janssen and Hamm (2012), people’s choice among different kinds of organic logos is examined. In Denmark and the Czech Republic, consumers were willing to pay higher for the products approved by the government. In Germany, the farmers’ association came into the picture and in Italy; the EU logo was the choice.

  5. For the impact of organic food on human health, see Mie et al. (2017) for an extensive review of evidence. Although the risk of allergic disease, overweight, and obesity may be reduced with organic consumption, the evidence is inconclusive as consumers of organic food tend to have healthier lifestyles overall.

  6. See Appendix for survey questions in Table 2 and 3.

  7. Participants aged 15 to 19 years were excluded from the econometric model, as they do not make any food purchase decisions in the household in general in Turkey. In the econometric model, employment statuses are excluded; housewife, retired and private sector employee statuses are added to avoid any correlation with other sociodemographical variables. Education levels are introduced as dummy variables for high school and college-Master/PhD graduates.

  8. We have checked for multicollinearity using variance inflation factors (VIF) analysis. To do that, we have set an upper limit of 10 for individual VIF level for each variable and an upper limit of 6 for the mean value of VIF. In addition, we have looked at the tolerance levels. In this manner, health concern motivation, organic spice consumption, and short-term storage of organic food products are eliminated.

  9. See Riefer and Hamm (2011), which provides insights for the decrease of organic food consumption in families with adolescent children in Germany.

  10. According to TURKSTAT (2012), the average percentage of smoking among adults is around 30% whereas it is 46% in our sample. We can say that the sample may be biased in terms of smoking.

  11. Chen (2009) finds similar results regarding the relationship between healthy lifestyle and organic consumption.

  12. Magnusson et al. (2003) find that consumers’ altruistic behaviors are more in the area of recycling than food choice. In addition, there is a discrepancy in the costs of both behaviors. While recycling is performed with small economic and behavioral costs, the purchase of organic foods requires a price premium and change of habits. The demand of food entails a variety of motives mentioned above. Thus, there are behavioral discrepancies between recycling and organic food consumption. Magnusson et al. (2003) also show that organic food consumption entails more egoistic motives such as health benefits than altruistic motives such as environmental benefits.

  13. Regarding the dilemma that an environmental conscious organic food consumer faces when buying organic food wrapped in plastic and polywrap see https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jan/20/supermarkets-organic-food-packaging.

  14. See also Wier et al. (2005) arguing based on industrialized and concentrated Danish and British organic markets with a high proportion of imported and sometimes highly processed foods, and large-scale production processes that consumers may not perceive these characteristics compatible with organic principles.

  15. Another application of k-means clustering to organic food market is by Tleis et al. (2017).

  16. Here, we have limited our analysis to a basket of product. For an analysis per organic product type refer to Krystallis and Chryssohoides (2005).

  17. We have checked for multicollinearity using variance inflation factors (VIF) analysis and looked at the tolerance levels. In this manner, we have eliminated health concern motivation, organic spice consumption, and short-term storage of organic food products for the first group. In the second group, we have excluded supermarket, food safety concern motivation, consuming organic fresh fruits and vegetables, legumes, eggs, baby food, drinks, oil, sugary food, and spice; believing that organic food products are nutritious, they have affordable prices and therapeutic property.

  18. Despite the importance of the production organic wheat and wheat products, fruits, dried fruits in particular raisins, figs, and hazelnuts, the organic animal production is only emerging in Turkey and products range from honey, wax, propolis, cheese, milk, and yogurt to poultry and eggs. Turkey produces different varieties and flavors of honey, and in the last several years, it has become one of the ten largest producers of honey in the world. However, the lack of governmental supports to livestock production, higher labor requirements, changes in land use policies, and urbanization, animal production legs behind competitive levels (Cakirli Akyüz and Theuvsen 2021).

  19. Karahan Uysal et al. (2013) characterized the consumers regarding their trust in organic labels and found the impact of purchasing frequency on logo recognition.

  20. The use of bio and eco as a prefix or suffix in the labeling of products other than organic products is forbidden by the Turkish legislation. The term natural is only reserved for olive oil even if it is not organic, as the production method has been described as such for years.

  21. There are other methods; i.e., Rodriguez et al. (2008) have made an analysis using Contingent Valuation Method based on survey conducted in the metropolitan region Buenos Aires city, Argentina, in April 2005 in order to calculate the willingness to pay for five selected organic products: regular milk, leafy vegetables, whole wheat flour, fresh chicken, and aromatic herbs and revealed that consumers are willing to pay a premium for these products.

  22. There are varying results regarding the impact of having children on organic food consumption. İlter and Yılmaz (2016) and Aydogdu and Kaya (2020) show evidence that the existence of children in the household improves organic consumption, whereas Gulseven (2018) finds that the presence of children does not have any statistically significant effect on the demand for organic milk.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, Galatasaray University, GIAM, Istanbul, Turkey

    Bilge Ozturk Goktuna

  2. Department of Economics, Istanbul Kultur University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Merve Hamzaoglu

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  1. Bilge Ozturk Goktuna
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Correspondence to Bilge Ozturk Goktuna.

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Appendix

Appendix

Tables 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10

Table 2 Description of variables in terms of survey questions to all participants
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Table 3 Description of variables in terms of survey questions to organic food consumers
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Table 4 The likelihood of being an organic food consumer
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Table 5 Distribution of the clusters
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Table 6 Nutrition dimension
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Table 7 Environment dimension
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Table 8 Health dimension
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Table 9 Perception of organic food
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Table 10 Consumer profile for different reservation values
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Goktuna, B.O., Hamzaoglu, M. Organic food demand in Turkey: segmentation from necessity to variety. Org. Agr. 13, 145–171 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13165-022-00418-x

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