Abstract
The current situation on the food market is influenced by various diet trends including eating healthy products. The honey consumption has an increasing tendency because more and more consumers consider honey as a healthy alternative to a refined sugar. The aim of this research paper was to identify consumption patterns regarding honey in terms of annual consumption, its frequency, volume of honey per purchase, consumption structure by family members and factors affecting consumers at honey purchase. The primary data was obtained from a questionnaire survey, which was conducted in Slovakia on the sample of 316 respondents as well as in Russia on the sample of 309 respondents. For a deeper analyses several assumptions were formulated where dependencies between demographic factors (age, education and income,) and annual consumption by using Chi-Square Test of Independence and Cramer´V coefficient, as well as, differences in factors affecting consumers at honey purchase by using Friedman test have been statistically tested. Based on the results it was found out that, the majority of Slovak consumers make honey reserves and prefer to buy 1 kg per purchase while the majority of Russian consumers purchase honey if necessary and prefer to buy 0.5 or 2 - 5 kg per purchase. Honey is generally consumed by all family members in both countries. The mostimportant factors for Slovak consumers was the country of origin (2.59) followed by taste (3.51), type (3.97) and price (4.18), while the least important factors were the size of packaging (6.70) and the design of packaging (6.80). For Russian consumers the most important factors werethe type (2.97), design of packaging (3.13), price (3.28) and taste (3.61) while the least important factors were the size of packaging (6.98), brand (6.50) and the country of origin (6.50). The majority of consumers in both countries consume from 2 to 5 kg annually and the only significant dependence was confirmed in case of respondents´ age. The annual consumption of young generation is lower in comparison to older generations.
Highlights
Honey is the most popular and important bee product
In the first question, we focused ona consumption structure of honey in families and we can observe that in Slovakia as well as in Russia the majority of consumers answered that honey is consumed by all family members (Figure 1)
Main factors affecting respondents at honey purchase for Slovak consumers were the country of origin, taste, type and price while for Russian consumers the main factors were type, design of packaging, price and taste
Summary
Honey is the most popular and important bee product. In general, honey is defined as a sweet substance from nectar or honeydew, which honeybees collect, transform with their enzymes and store in honeycomb (Veselý et al, 2013). According to Marghitas et al (2010) honey can be classified as a complex food regarding to standards for nutrients, as natural and healthy product. It contains simple sugars, flavonoids, organics and amino acids, vitamins and minerals. Based on the results ofa Romanian research, the main motivation for consuming honey is eating healthy This global trend causes an increase in honey consumption. Factors such medical condition, price and high quality affect consumer purchasing behaviour. The aim of this research paper is to identify consumption patterns regarding honey, as well as, examine selected factors affecting consumption and consumer purchasing behaviour in Slovakia and Russia. Obtained data were analysed in the statistical program – SAS Enterprise Guide 5.1 and we applied these statistical methods: Chi-Square Test of Independence Friedman test CramerV coefficient
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