Assessing public interest, risk perceptions, and awareness of food safety in Saudi Arabia: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study conducted in Saudi Arabia to investigate public interest, risk perceptions, and awareness of food safety and its association with population characteristics among a large-scale, randomly selected sample. Of the 1000 participants, almost half (43.9%) indicated their reliance on food safety when making any food-related decisions. When assessing the relationship between food-related decisions and potential predictor variables, only age and educational level yielded significant results. The findings also showed that health physicians, followed by social media, were the channels most frequently used to obtain information about food-related risks. Moreover, the majority believed that food safety is better in current times and willing to pay more for notably approved and safe food products (67.3%). However, the results revealed an extensive lack of awareness of how the Saudi food safety system works, and the regression indicated that only age and disease presence yielded significant results. The present findings provide invaluable platform data for food-producing companies and regulatory authorities to recognise consumer interests and perceptions of food safety as an important determinant of the attitudes of people toward health. The findings also provide better insights into the extent to which the population is aware of the Saudi food safety system as well as the credibility of the sources that consumers use to find information about food safety.