An Investigation of Consumers' Consciousness Level About Food Safety in Honey Consumption: The Case of Niğde Province

Abstract

Recently, food safety which has become one of the decisive factor in demand for all food products, is becoming a major concern due to increasing sensitivity of consumers to food production and consumption. As honey is produced and marketed on more uncontrolled conditions, which is relatively different from other agricultural products, the food safety issue is becoming more intense. In this study, it is examined what kind of applications are applied in food safety in bee products in Turkey. In the second part of the study, it is aimed to determine the importance of food safety in honey consumption of urban consumers in Niğde province based on the primary data and to put consumer's consciousness in this subject. For this purpose, it was conducted a survey by interviewing face to face with 286 consumers. In the study, besides basic statistical methods, univariate analysis of variance and factor analysis method were also used to determine the effective factors in purchasing according to income groups. As a result of the research, it was determined that there is a great lack of confidence in the quality of honey in purchasing from the market due to both the concern of sugar added fraudulent honey and residual problem by consumers. For this reason, consumers prefer to buy honey from directly producers rather than market. In addition, consumers are more likely to believe that honey is less safety than in previous years. Health consciousness is an important factor in consumers purchasing honey and health and quality consciousness develops positively especially as the income level of consumers‘ increases.