Consumers’ purchase intention toward organic foods: a study among UiTM lecturers in northern region, Malaysia / Siti Meriam Ali ... [et al.]

According to Wier and Calverley (2002), consumer interest in organic food has grown tremendously in many industrialized countries during the past ten years. It is observed that the organic food is also one of the fastest growing areas of the food market in Europe, Northern America, Australia and Japan with sales being in excess of $1 I 4.5 billion in 1999 (Makatouni, 2002). Growth has been especially high in Denmark, which also the highest per capita consumption of organic food in the world as reported in Produce Studies, 1998: USDA, 2000 (as cited in Wier and Calverly, 2002, p.4). The highest level of development of the Danish organic food sector is attributed to the strong suppert and directive from the government and institutional arrangements between farmers and centralized food trade (Squires, Juric and Cornwell, 2001 ). Organic food consumption has become mainstreamed in the food industry in develop countries especially United States and Europe (Lockie, 2006). Demand for organic food is growing in international markets and attracts more and more large- sca le businesses to enter the organic industry. The Giobal Strategic Business Report (2C06) reveals that countries such as the USA, Germany, Great Britain, Denmark, Italy and Austria are world leaders in the trends towards organic food. The report also predicts that global spending on organic food will exceed USD86 billion by 2009 and perccived health benefits will dominate consumers preferences for organic food. The report farther notes that most of the world regions are gaining high growth rates in organic consumption; amongst them, the USA, Germany and Great Britain enjoy the largest growth in dollar terms. Today, organic consumption is closely associated not only with health concerns, but also with social, economic and ecological sustainability. Agricultural and food industry experts agree that the peak of the organic food trend has not yet been reached and there is still plenty of international growth potential in the organic market (Ebrahimi, 2007).