Consumers across five European countries prioritise animal welfare above environmental sustainability when buying meat and dairy products

Conclusions

In terms of product attributes, participants valued freshness, quality/taste, and animal welfare as the most important when buying meat and dairy products. Producers should ensure that sustainable products score high on these attributes to make them attractive. Overall, participants across the five European countries perceived sustainability labels for meat and dairy products as helpful. However, labels alone are not enough to change behaviour, especially for consumers who have low or no behavioural intention to buy sustainable meat or dairy products. Therefore, these results should be translated into additional policy measures, such as nudges or behavioural interventions, helping individuals translate their attitudes into behaviour and facilitating the choice of sustainable products. On product labels, consumers valued information regarding animal welfare, food safety, and health and nutrition. Producers can use these findings to market particularly sustainable products in a more targeted way and make them more attractive to consumers. From our country comparisons, we can conclude that the same information regarding, for instance, animal welfare and the government management of the countryside can be used by actors in meat and dairy value chains in a number of different countries. Future research should also extend to countries outside Europe.