Presented at the Regional Symposium on Marketing and Finance of the Organic Supply Chain, 23 ~ 26 September 2012

1. FACTORS AFFECTING BUYING BEHAVIOR OF
ORGANIC VEGETABLE CONSUMERS IN
THAILAND
Regional Symposium on Marketing and Finance of the Organic
Supply Chain, 23-26 September 2012, NACF Head office,
Seoul, Republic of Korea
K. Haisoke, A.Noomhorm and A.S. Sangha

2.  Back ground &
Introduction
 Literature review
 Methodology
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 Result
 Recommendations
OUTLINE

3. BACKGROUND
 Organic fruit and vegetables are becoming
popular among consumers in Thailand. While
leading supermarkets are catering to the demand
for organic products from health conscious
consumers, there are a number of challenges in
the supply chain which affect the buying decision
of consumer.
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4. INTRODUCTION
 Thailand has about 13,900 hectare of land under
organic cultivation which equals to 0.07% of total
agricultural area when compared to Asian average of
0.16% (Willer & Yussefi, 2005).
 According to the 9 th Thailand national economic and
social development plan the main focus is to enhance
the production of organic products under “Thailand
Kitchen of the World”.
 The main idea behind the plan was to increase export
revenue and adoption of strict food safety measures.
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5. INTRODUCTION CONT...
 Adoption of good agricultural practices to enhance
quality standards for safe and healthy delivery of
organic products to the local consumer.
 Thai Organic Agriculture Certification (Act 2003) aims
to develop self reliant integrated farming system for
production management rich in diversity of flora,
fauna, on farm nutrients and renewable resources in
order to maintain ecological sustainability.
4.1

6. LITERATURE
 The organic vegetable retail sector in Thailand is
mainly driven by private companies, government
sponsored projects and a few farmer associations.
 Recently, food quality, consumer health and food
safety have become important issues, which has
resulted in government taking steps to take care of
the environment.
 General public awareness is important to make
consumers believe in the food safety and certification
of a product as organic (Panyakul,2003; Roitner,2006).
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7. LITERATURE CONT…
 The attractiveness of organic products and the
consumers’ willingness to buy depends upon the
marketing strategy used by retail outlets and its
advertisement.
 Highlighting the benefits of healthy organic food, its
reasonable pricing and assurances of food quality are
important.
 It is also essential to distinguish between products
grown from sustainable or conventional farming
methods available in market in relation to price &
safety for a health conscious consumer.
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8. OBJECTIVE
 The specific objective of this research study was to
identify factors affecting buying behavior of organic
vegetables consumer
 Research studies by other authors:
 for perishable products; consumers willingness to
pay a premium price if the product is of high
quality (freshness), safe and readily available
Thompson (1998).
 older people with high incomes were willing to
pay more to purchase ‘safe’ vegetables (Posri et
al., 2007).
 Lockie et al. (2002), found that males in Bangkok were
more likely to consume organic vegetables than
females.
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9. METHODOLOGY
 Primary data collected from questionnaires distributed to customers at
Villa Market at Paradise Park and TOPS supermarket.
 WMS = 5f1+4f2+3f3+2f4+1f5 (Schiffman et.al., 1994)
TRN
 f1 = the number of respondents who selected 5 point scale
 f2 = the number of respondents who selected 4 point scale
 f3= the number of respondents who selected 3 point scale
 f4= the number of respondents who selected 2 point scale
 f5= the number of respondents who selected 1 point scale
TRN = the number of total questionnaire respondents
WMS = average weight of the influencing factor of the respondents buying
decision
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10. QUESTIONNAIRE PARTS
Part 1 Profile of respondents Gender, age, career,
income, education,
status, etc
Part 2 Kind of organic
vegetable consumer
buy
Buying location /
Selection of sellers
Part 3 Influential factors Product, Price, place,
culture, psychological,
etc
Part 4 Identification of
problems
Unstable price, quality,
number of shops,
promotion
Part 5 Main deterrent factor
for consumer who
never buy organic / not
buy anymore
Pricing, quality, safety
etc
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11. RESULTS
 Profile of respondents
 Most of the respondents were single (72%).
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12. RESPONDENTS
Valid Response Frequency Percent Valid
percent
Cumulative
Percent
yes 54 56.0 56.0 56.0
never 45 30.0 30.0 86.0
buy in the past but
now do not buy
21 14.0 14.0 100.0
Total 150 100.0 100.0
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The results demonstrated that most respondents (56%) had
purchased organic vegetables
30 % of respondents never bought organic

13. SELLERS AND TYPES OF
VEGETABLES
 Selection of organic vegetables
 Selection of organic vegetable sellers
10
Kind of Organic Vegetables Quantity Percentage (%)
1.Organic Lettuce 51 34
2.Organic Cabbage 42 28
3.Organic Morning Glory 24 16
4.Organic Tomato 18 12
5.Organic Potato 15 10

14. FACTORS AFFECTING CONSUMER
BEHAVIOR
 Individual factors: The results found that age and
income levels had a strong correlationship: organic
buyers’ tended to be older than 30-39 years (46%).
 Cultural factors: This included cooking and eating
food at home, influence of festival seasons and social
status
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15. FACTORS AFFECTING CONSUMER
BEHAVIOR
 Social factors: This aspect included the influence
of people around the consumer. Suggestions
from family, friends and cousins, colleagues and
agricultural officers were found to have some
influence.
 Psychological factors: Safe to consume, social
respect, healthy to eat and environmentally
friendly were the most influential variables.
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16. FACTORS AFFECTING CONSUMER
BEHAVIOR
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17. CONCLUSION
Factors of high influence
product factors (3.41), price factors (3.68),
distribution factors (3.79), cultural factors (3.42) and
psychological factors (3.92)
Factors of moderate influence
Promotional factors (3.03) and social factors (3.10)
Main problems associated with purchase
Lack of confidence in quality, high price, unattractive
shops and less variety of organic products in stores.
Main deterrent factor in case of non-organic buyers
Higher pricing followed by lack of promotion
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18. RECOMMENDATIONS
 The government policies and regulations
ensuring safety through certification of organic
products in the market will induce confidence
among the consumers to buy organic products.
 Awareness raising through public campaigns &
advertisements can help to increase the
knowledge about certification and labeling which
will change psychological perception of the
general consumer to buy organic products.
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19.  The pricing policing should be regulated and
monitored by the government agencies to avoid
unstable pricing and higher pricing issues.
 Variety of organic products in the market can be
increased by providing incentives to the farmers
to grow different vegetables through government
subsidy and schemes to promote organic
agriculture
 Private sector backed by the government policies
on selling organic products can help to open new
stores at convenient locations for more
consumer accessibility of organic products.
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20. THANK YOU
CHRIS.KIYADA@GMAIL.COM
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