Amount of Information and consumers' willingness to pay for food traceability in China

Abstract

This study employs random nth price auction to investigate consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for food traceability system with both abbreviated and detailed information. Results show that consumers have a positive WTP for both kind of food traceability systems, and on average the premium for apples with detailed information is 10 percent higher than that of apples with abbreviated information. Males, the married and those with relatively low level of education have high premiums for detailed traceability information, while the self-reported healthy consumers would not like to pay much more premium for detailed information. The results also show that consumers show much interest in information of quality certificate and chemical fertilizers/pesticides used in food production provided by food traceability system. Implications for implementing food traceability system were discussed.