welfare, and a country of origin. Most of these properties are connected with features derived from a
production process.
The amount of information available from the credence characteristics is crucial. Information is
usually considered as a public good, and for that reason it is undersupplied in the market (Henson and
Traill 1993). The nature of public good is nonrival and nonexcludable. However, Antle (1999) argues
that information can be considered as a club good that is nonrival but excludable. In that case the role
of government is to create the legal framework that enables consumers to obtain and use information.
Consequently, one important question is that which actor(s) in the food chain should offer the required
information, by what means and at what cost. Different types of contracts and quality systems could be
an answer also for the demand for credence characteristics in the food products. These contracts and
systems, their contents and impacts, urgently need further research, including the more novel netchain
analyses, in order to make the food chain to operate efficiently (see e.g. Ziggers et al. 1998; Lazzarini
et al. 2001; Omta et al. 2001; Vertanen 2001).
3. Survey design
There is no market data available for examining willingness to pay (WTP) for new, additional
information. The most commonly used method to measure economic benefits for a nonmarket good is
the contingent valuation method (CVM). In this method consumers are asked ex ante their WTP in
order to obtain a benefit, which is presented in hypothetical scenario concerning the good in question.
The other well-known and quite often employed methods are cost-of-illness (COI) method and
hedonic price (HP) analysis. According to our and others' evaluations of the COI and HP methods,
which are based on wider assessments in the relevant literature (e.g. Jensen and Basiotis 1993, Buzby
et al. 1996), we choose the contingent valuation as the most applicable method for our objectives. It is
most often used method in studies dealing with food quality and safety characteristics. The difficulty
of the CV method is usually that it is used for valuation of a good, often a public good, without a price
on some imaginary markets.
In our study this is not so serious a problem as we do have a real, private good, i.e. beef, with a
price on actual markets. As a research method the CV method requires a survey, in which the
consumers/citizens are asked how much they would be willing to pay for the supply or production of a
public good, e.g. the reduction of health risk (Henson 1996). In our survey we asked consumers how
much they would be willing to pay for additional information concerning quality and safety
characteristics of beef. The main survey was conducted with the aid of the GallupKanava panel, which
is a system in which answers and information is collected via personal computers from overall 1,300
regular respondents for different surveys and opinion polls. One third of the sample is changed
annually in the GallupKanava system. In our study the statistically representative sample comprised of
1,000 households. The answers were given by those persons, above 15 years of age, in the household
who usually make the purchasing decisions, i.e. there could be more than one respondent in a
household. The CV questionnaire included questions about consumers’ (1) buying and preparing
habits of beef, (2) paying attention to present labels and other information, (3) risk perceptions, (4)
awareness of food safety risks, and (5) demographics.
4. Results
There were 1,640 usable questionnaires. Of the 1,640 respondents, 22% were the primary
shoppers for the household and 54% “split shopping duty in half” with someone else. 95% of the
respondents eat beef, or food products made from beef, one third of them at least weekly. Hence, they
know the product and are assumed, to some extent, to be aware of the characteristics associated to beef
and food products based on beef.
First, the respondents were asked how often they pay attention to the present information or
labels in beef products. Results indicate that most important information or properties in the present
situation are the dates of expiration and packaging, and colour of beef. The third important factor to
which consumers clearly pay attention was the label marked ‘Finnish Beef’. The price of beef was