Meat consumption – what French consumers feel about the quality of beef?

Marie-Pierre Ellies-Oury,Alexandre Lee,Hervé Jacob,Jean-François Hocquette

doi:10.1080/1828051x.2018.1551072

Abstract

The first aim of this study conducted in France was to examine consumer habits concerning beef consumption, as well as any reasons, which may explain the relative decline in interest in beef consumption. Two surveys were conducted based on a sample of 625 beef consumers to analyse the frequency of their meat consumption and its evolution. The survey also aimed to explore consumers’ understanding of the new labelling system, which was introduced in France in 2015 to indicate the eating quality potential of cuts with stars. Half of the respondents have reduced their beef consumption. Whereas inconsistency in eating quality is one reason among others which contribute to explain this decline, results showed that 70% of the respondents have not seen yet the new labels on beef. Nevertheless, this system represents a major progress for the French beef sector and should be developed further. Indeed, French consumers would be interested in a meat grading system based on tenderness as the one in Australia. Such a system could reduce the decline in beef consumption and even reverse this negative trend.HighlightsThe decline in meat consumption may be explained by the high price of beef, and concerns about health, environment, eating quality and animal welfare.A large proportion of the respondents (72%) is not aware of the new labelling system for beef in supermarket self-service aisles.Further developing this new system to a grading scheme similar to the ‘Meat Standards Australia’ would be judicious.

Highlights

Meat consumption/experience characteristics, as well as quality factors, determine purchasing decisions, consumer expectations and consumer satisfaction: psychological, personal, sensory and marketing factors are major drivers of meat consumption (Tomasevic et al 2018)
Reasons to eat beef or to eat less beef Respondents taking part in the face-to-face survey say they eat beef because they like its taste (87%), and because meat is a source of various important nutrients such as protein and iron (50% of the respondents)
The same arguments were put forward by the respondents surveyed on the internet but with a slightly different ranking, that is, rearing and slaughtering conditions had much greater importance for this population, which is mostly made up of young people who are probably more sensitive to the campaigns of animal welfare associations and/ or anti-meat associations

Summary

Introduction

Meat consumption/experience characteristics, as well as quality factors, determine purchasing decisions, consumer expectations and consumer satisfaction: psychological, personal, sensory (product specific) and marketing factors (market-based) are major drivers of meat consumption (Tomasevic et al 2018). While meat consumption rises with economic development, it is increasingly being challenged in affluent sections of the population due to the environmental and human health implications of eating too much meat (Tilman and Clark 2014). France is the largest producer and consumer of beef in Europe, and the slow decline in meat consumption has been observed in this country. This phenomenon is noticeable for beef (Sans and Legrand 2018), that is, the decrease in the proportion of beef consumption in French meat consumption is significant (À2.5% per year from 1999 to 2006). Meat consumption is on the decline, consumers increasingly appear to want high-quality meat cuts, that is, characterised by consistently high levels of quality

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Conclusion