Canadian consumers' preferences for food safety and agricultural environment safety

Rosati and Saba (2004:493) followed previous studies in focusing on perceptions of knowledge of those controlling risks, the honesty and capabilities of regulators dealing with food-related hazards, and perceptions of the concern for the public and the health of citizens held by food safety regulators and agencies as factors that might influence food risk perceptions. [...] Focus of this Study The major objective of the current study is to understand the nature of Canadian consumers’ perceptions of selected food and environmental risks associated with agriculture and to assess factors that may be associated with these risk perceptions. [...] It is hoped that the findings of the study will be useful in contributing to a better understanding of the food risk concerns of Canadian consumers. [...] As explained subsequently, three different sets of models were applied to assess the influence of demographic and socioeconomic factors on the concern rankings for each of the cited eight food safety issues (bacteria contamination, pesticide residuals, use of hormones, use of antibiotics, BSE, food additives, GM/GE, fat and cholesterol), and for the cited six environmental issues (water pollution [...] The multivariate probit model extends the bivariate probit model to M equations, applying to each of the m issues, allowing information in the error terms of the individual equations to be considered in the estimation process (Greene 2003).