Traditional food products vs. global economy: Consumer perspective

Abstract

The Osijek-Baranya County at the East part of Croatia, generally is known as lowland region in whose economy agriculture and food industry are of great importance. Eastern Croatia abounds in various traditional products, mainly based on smoked pork. The goal of this paper is to identify consumers' attitudes and behavior towards East Croatia traditional food products (TFP). Furthermore, the model for market power evaluation of each East Croatia TFP is created according to consumers¨ preferences and attitudes results. The research was performed in Osijek-Baranya County in spring 2019. The sample was consisted of 500 randomly chosen respondents older than 18 via self-fulfilled questionnaire survey. In paper is used descriptive, parametric and non-parametric statistics. People in East Croatia have a positive attitude to TFP of their region. Survey results related to supply, quality, demand and price willingness are used to modelling coefficient for East Croatia TFP commercialization. This coefficient can help producers and policy makers to decide easier about the most perspective production from market point of view. According to the survey results, production of kulen, cottage cheese, ham, honey and sausages are the most promising.