Hanbin Lee, Robin Goldstein, and Dan Sumner, economists at CAIL, analyzed the
demand for food attributes, specifically organic claims and fresh-cut attributes, during the
pandemic. This analysis was conducted using extensive survey data collected from US carrot buyers. Hanbin Lee, one of the co-authors, presented these findings at the Agricultural Economics Workshop hosted by the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of California, Davis. He reported that, during COVID-19, the median estimate of willingness to pay for organic attributes experienced a slight increase. Conversely, the median estimate of willingness to pay for fresh-cut attributes – referred to as “baby-cut” in marketplaces – saw a slight decrease during the pandemic.
Abstract
This paper explores empirically the WTPs for the organic attribute and the baby-cut attribute (a fresh-cut attribute) of carrot products and focuses on how the WTP responded to the massive economic shock and market disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A series of on-line survey responses were collected from hundreds of thousands of U.S. carrot buyers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns. We estimate that the median estimate of the WTP for an organic attribute rose from $0.05 before COVID-19 to $0.07 per pound during COVID-19. The median estimate of the WTP for the baby-cut attribute fell from $0.56 before COVID-19 to $0.51 per pound during COVID-19. The estimates of changes in WTP were not statistically significant for either attribute even with quite large national samples.
More Information: Please follow the provided link for additional details.
URL: https://are.ucdavis.edu/department/seminars/2021/2/18/hanbin-lee/19585/