Organic vs. Conventional Food in Romania: An Overview of the Buying Decision

In this chapter, the Romanian organic food sector is analysed from a consumer’s perspective, mainly behaviours or preferences towards organic vs conventional food. The analyse is necessary as organic food represents a trending and debated sector, generating solutions for multiple issues but at higher costs and by declining other industries (genetic engineering). Thus, this chapter presents the main factors that influence the buying decision, when exchanging conventional to an organic choice. A literature review contributes to designing an organic purchase matrix for Romanian consumers. The identified model distinguishes multiple interacting layers, each factor standing as a validation point for the subsequent: socio-demographic, economic, knowledge, personal beliefs, products characteristics, guarantees, availability. The last part of the research represents a matrix testing phase, the main results of a quantitative analysis supports the model’s variable sequence and highlights a limitation of the buying decision at the first level of factors: socio-demographic and economic.