Animal welfare concern and attitudes towards more animal welfare friendly meat products: characterization and segmentation

The aim of this paper is to analyze consumers' concern on farm animal welfare and their attitudes towards animal friendly meat products to establish consumers' segments. First, factors affecting consumers' concern on farm animal welfare have been studied using an Ordered Probit model. Second, consumers' segmentation based on their attitudes towards animal friendly meat products has been conducted using a cluster analysis. With this purpose, a personal interview was carried out on a representative sample of inhabitants in Zaragoza through a structured questionnaire. Results indicate that Spaniards are concerned about farm animal welfare and women are more concerned than men. Moreover, people who think on animal welfare issues in their food purchasing decision confirm having bought some animal friendly meat product. Finally, those people more involved in the environment are also more concerned with animal welfare. About half of the interviewed people are potential consumers of animal friendly meat products since they are willing to purchase these products because they are more concerned about animal welfare and show positive attitudes towards animal friendly meat products.