A little more than half of Canadians say they trust the organic label — which should worry the sector since trust is critical currency with consumers.
It’s what justifies the higher price of organic food, said marketing expert Jo-Ann McArthur.
That’s based on Canada Organic data, which says 54 per cent of Canadians say they trust Canada Organic Certified.
“I thought that was really low,” McArthur said, who added she suspects customer confusion may be to blame.
McArthur, who is president of the Nourish Food Marketing, spoke on 2022 food trends during the Prairie Organics Conference on February 9.
She said consumers may not understand what organic means or may be getting lost in a sea of food claims. Based on search engine terms used in Canada, people have a lot of questions about organics.
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How food is made matters to Canadian consumers. Decisions and language used can raise or break trust with consumers, McArthur said.
“Buttergate” is an example, she said.
‘Buttergate’ is the name given to a scandal of sorts that began sometime between fall 2020 and spring 2021 when people took to social media to wonder why butter seemed to stay hard at room temperature.
Calgary food writer Julie Van Rosendaal put the issue into the spotlight. She theorized palm fat, or palmitic acid, in feed supplements fed to dairy cattle was the culprit.
Before long, the story spread beyond Canadian media to outlets like NPR, the BBC and Al Jazeera.
Palmitic acid had been used for a long time, McArthur said, but consumers didn’t know that. The negative connotations of palm oil, like deforestation, cast a pall over Canadian dairy and sales took a hit.
“They weren’t prepared for that,” McArthur said of the dairy industry. “They never checked how consumers would view that.”
Farmers and producer groups can’t assume consumers know or understand how they farm. They should be prepared to answer questions when they come.
However, calling out good practices farmers are already doing may be an opportunity, McArthur said.
She said the dairy industry is calling out that most milk in the grocery store is local. It always has been, but people didn’t know. Likewise, A&W advertised meat raised without hormones and antibiotics.
“Of course,” McArthur said — but consumers didn’t know that.
There’s also a small but growing market for foods labelled ‘glyphosate free,’ McArthur said.
Transparency in food has been a trend for years, says Nourish’s 2022 trend report. “Now it’s become an expectation rather than a ‘nice to know.’
“There is rising consumer demand from brands for total openness regarding the product life story, including sourcing ingredients, processing practices, the label and packaging,” the report says.
“It’s time to pull back the curtain, invite consumers in and be fully transparent about your ingredients and sourcing, and how you treat your employees,” it adds.
Some companies have turned to technology to do this. For instance, Italy’s biggest grocery chain, Coop, uses QR codes to show customers the entire supply chain food products moved down.
Tech platform iFinca helps customers trace participating coffee brands back to the farmer, including producers’ stories and how much they were paid, the report says.
People are more aware of social justice issues related to food, McArthur added — for instance, issues related to temporary foreign workers have got a lot of press during the pandemic.
She said she’s starting to see a rise in use of the “Food Justice Certified” label, which represents fair-labour and fair-trade practices. This has potential to replace the Fairtrade label, she added.
