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African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development
Rural Outreach Program
ISSN: 1684-5358 EISSN: 1684-5358
Vol. 17, No. 4, 2017, pp. 12916-12929
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Bioline Code: nd17103
Full paper language: English
Document type: Research Article
Document available free of charge
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African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, Vol. 17, No. 4, 2017, pp. 12916-12929
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CONSUMERS’ VIEWS AND USE OF LABELS ON FOOD ITEMS SOLD IN BULAWAYO URBAN PROVINCE, ZIMBABWE
Ncube, T; Makurunje, S & Dube, S
Abstract
Food labels are a medium by which consumers acquire knowledge about packaged
foods they are considering to purchase. The label makes the first impression about a
product and has a great effect on the purchasing decision for consumers. In recent
years, literate consumers have become interested in nutritional issues. Lifestyle, age,
dietary and safety concerns have been the contributing factors to nutritional awareness
by consumers. Nutritional labels can generally have a positive impact on food
consumption and may save health-care costs for those consumers with health concerns.
On the other hand, for those consumers who are illiterate, price may be more important
in making purchase decisions. This study intended to investigate how consumers in
Bulawayo Urban Province (Zimbabwe) view and use labels on packaged food items.
Seventy-five randomly selected consumers were questioned about their perceptions,
attitudes and use of label information using open ended structured questionnaires. The
consumers were selected on the basis of being present at the supermarkets at the time of
sampling. The respondents were interviewed at different times of the day to cater for
employed and unemployed people. The results obtained indicate that the extent to
which food labels are used depends on factors such as price of food products,
individual health needs and gender. For consumers who use food labels to make their
purchase decisions, not all the information on the label is considered. Items on the
labels to which the consumers responded were brand, nutritional profile and mass of
product in relation to the price. The label elements which were extensively used by
consumers in this study are date mark (81.3%), weight of food (89.3%) and price
(77.3%). The least used element is the nutritional panel (50.7%). About 44% of the
consumers were not sure about the trustworthiness of the information given on food
labels. Food labels are important to a greater extent for people with special dietary
requirements, while the remainder of the studied population are influenced by price in
their purchase decisions. Consumers seem not to understand some of the information
on the food labels because of the difficulties in interpreting what is written.
Keywords
Consumer; packaged food; labels; nutrition; nutritional panel; perceptions; purchase; behaviour
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