Assessment of ginger benefits awareness and willingness to pay.A case of rural households at New Forest Village, Bushbuckridge Local Municipality, Mpumalanga Province

Abstract

Due to a lack of adequate information on ginger’s nutritional and medical value to an individual’s health, most rural households do not often purchase ginger. Therefore, this study aims to determine the household’s awareness and willingness to pay for ginger. A simple random sampling procedure was used to select 53 respondents, and primary data were collected through an online questionnaire. Descriptive statistics and a binary logistic regression model were used for data analyses. Descriptive statistics revealed that the average age of the respondents was 39 years. Also, most respondents (77.4%) indicated they were aware of the health benefits of ginger, and approximately 45.3% indicated that they purchase ginger on a monthly basis. Lastly, most respondents (73.6%) were willing to pay for ginger. Regression estimates showed that gender, cost of ginger and frequency of ginger purchasing influenced rural households’ willingness to pay for ginger. Since gender was found to be a significant variable, the study, therefore, recommends that women should be encouraged to purchase functional foods when buying groceries for their households. This may enhance healthy habits and ultimately reduce households’ medical expenditure because functional foods can have preventive and corrective impacts for some illnesses.