A influência de aspectos relativos à saúde e ao meio ambiente sobre a intenção de compra de alimentos orgânicos

Abstract

Food choices become more meaningful when it is taken into account that they are directly related to health. Likewise, these decisions already reflect aspects regarding environmental correction and it has been demonstrated a growing interest in the ecological responsibility behind consumed food. Organic food is considered healthy and environmentally friendly, then becoming relevant the investigation about these two constructs associated to the shopping intention of consumers. This study sought to investigate how the aspects related to the environmental awareness and the pursuing of health influence the shopping attitudes and intentions of organic food consumers in Ceará market. To this end, it was applied a survey research type and an integrated model was tested by means of the technique known as structural equation modeling (SEM) in order to observe the relations between the constructs concerning the environment, the health and the theory of planned behavior, which analyze the attitudes and intentions of consumers. The results indicate that there is a positive influence of the motivations related to health on the attitudes towards organics, the same occurring to these attitudes on the shopping intentions related to that type of food. Furthermore, it was observed that the aspects regarding environmental concerns do not influence the shopping intentions of organics in market under research. From a managerial point of view, the contributions from this study reside in the comprehension of the determining variables of the shopping behavior of an ascending market, what suggests basis to the development of strategies, by the agents of the productive chain, adequate to the analyzed market.