Gm Food
Title: What attitudes does consumers have on purchasing genetically modified foods (GMF)?
Introduction:
“Genetically modified (GM) foods are food items that have had their DNA changed through genetic engineering.” (Mavis 2008). As the population of the world has continued to grow, the supply pressure of food has become more and more significant. With the development of Genetically Modified biotechnology, GM Foods have been come into our daily lives. Though GM foods can help to improve the quality of life, there are risks to complete trust in GM foods. What’s more important, a part of consumers still have doubts about the understanding towards GM food.
The question” What attitudes does consumers have on purchasing genetically modified food?” is meaningful because that the issue about GM foods is becoming increasingly controversial. The controversies towards GM foods generally focus on environmental ethics, food security, poverty alleviation and environmental conservation. As customers are divided on their relative importance, some supporters claim that the GM technology can solve the problem of food crisis and poverty. They also consider that GM foods are beneficial to environment such as they can protect soil and water. However, opponents think that GM foods should have some potential threat to human health and they violate the rules of nature by mixing genes among different species. The purpose of this research is to gain a deep understand about the consumers’ attitudes towards purchasing GM foods and find out if most of consumers can accept GM foods. (Hutchison, 2004)
Literature review
In the last few years, many articles on the consumers’ attitudes toward GM food have appeared. There is a concise review of existing literature that evaluates consumers’ attitudes as following.
Most of the information on European attitudes comes from a journal by Bredahl, Grunert, and Scholderer (2003). The article focuses on posted and answered four questions on
Introduction:
“Genetically modified (GM) foods are food items that have had their DNA changed through genetic engineering.” (Mavis 2008). As the population of the world has continued to grow, the supply pressure of food has become more and more significant. With the development of Genetically Modified biotechnology, GM Foods have been come into our daily lives. Though GM foods can help to improve the quality of life, there are risks to complete trust in GM foods. What’s more important, a part of consumers still have doubts about the understanding towards GM food.
The question” What attitudes does consumers have on purchasing genetically modified food?” is meaningful because that the issue about GM foods is becoming increasingly controversial. The controversies towards GM foods generally focus on environmental ethics, food security, poverty alleviation and environmental conservation. As customers are divided on their relative importance, some supporters claim that the GM technology can solve the problem of food crisis and poverty. They also consider that GM foods are beneficial to environment such as they can protect soil and water. However, opponents think that GM foods should have some potential threat to human health and they violate the rules of nature by mixing genes among different species. The purpose of this research is to gain a deep understand about the consumers’ attitudes towards purchasing GM foods and find out if most of consumers can accept GM foods. (Hutchison, 2004)
Literature review
In the last few years, many articles on the consumers’ attitudes toward GM food have appeared. There is a concise review of existing literature that evaluates consumers’ attitudes as following.
Most of the information on European attitudes comes from a journal by Bredahl, Grunert, and Scholderer (2003). The article focuses on posted and answered four questions on
Bibliography: Bredahl,L, Grunert,G and Scholderer,J (2003). “Four questions on European consumers’ attitudes toward the use of genetic modification in food production” Journal of innovative Food Science & Emerging Technologies. Volume 4, Issue 4, December 2003, Pages 435-445 Cook, A & Moore, K (2002). “Attitudes and intentions towards purchasing GM food.” Journal of Economic Psychology. Volume 23, Issue 5, October 2002, Pages 557-572 Hoban, T.J. (1999). “Consumer acceptance of biotechnology in the United States and Japan.” Journal of Food Technology, 53(5), 250-53. Sallie, J & Michael, B (2004). “Consumer preferences for GM food and other attributes of the food system.” Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics. Volume 47, Issue 4, pages 501–518, December 2007. Lone Bredahl (2005) “Determinants of Consumer Attitudes and Purchase Intentions With Regard to Genetically Modified Food – Results of a Cross-National Survey” JOURNAL OF CONSUMER POLICY Volume 24, Number 1, 23-61, DOI: 10.1023/A:1010950406128