Organic food is food produced by
methods that comply with the standards of organic farming. Basically organic
farming in general terms means the farming practices that have been adopted by
the farmer, without using any chemical or artificial sources of nutrients or
crop protection methods. The produce obtained from such a practice is termed as
organic foods.
The term ‘organic farming’ was coined in 1939, by Lord Northbourne in his book Look to the Land (1940), out of his conception of “the farm as
organism,” to describe a holistic, ecologically balanced approach to
farming—in contrast to what he called chemical farming, which relied on “imported fertility” and
“cannot be self-sufficient nor an organic whole.”
Consumers today have developed a close affinity towards
organic foods, due to increased awareness among them towards leading a healthy
life style. With increased incidence of various fatal and non-fatal diseases
day by day, globally, the consumer awareness towards avoidance of such
diseases, by maintain a healthy diet, has made the emergence of a wider market,
towards organic foods, in the world food market
The increased belief that organic foods are safer for
consumption with high nutritional value and better taste compared to the
conventionally grown food products, have become the important reason for the
consumers to go for a purchase of organic food products. These properties of
organic food products have also made the organic food industries to promote their
products. The emergence of many organic certification agencies, have made it
easier for the related industries as well as the consumers to gain assurance on
the organic food products for consumption.
India stands
along with Argentina, Brazil, China and Uruguay, for having the largest area
under organic cultivation (Willer and Kilcher, 2009). India’s ranks 15 in terms of World’s Organic Agricultural land (FIBL
& IFOAM Year Book 2015). The total area under organic certification is 5.71million Hectare (2015-16).
India produced around 1.35 million MT (2015-16) of all varieties of certified
organic food products. Madhya Pradesh has covered
largest area under followed by Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan. (FIBL
& IFOAM Year Book 2015)
Though India
has witnessed an increasing trend towards consumption of organic food products
in the recent days, but rate of consumption and shift towards the organic foods
in not seen to the expected levels. Though theres an increase in awareness
among the indain consumers in general and urban consumers in particular, there
are still few factors that are hampering the consumers from adopting organic
foods to a bigger extent in their daily diet. Though some studies have been
conducted regarding motivations for consumer towards organic food purchase and
factors influencing consumer buying process of organic food products, no
studies have been conducted to understand the factors that are preventing the
consumers to shift towards organic food consumption and to understand what are
the consumer expectation from the organic food market. Thus an attempt has been
made to understand the underlying factors that are hampering the consumption of
organic food consumption and also get an insight to consumer expectations from
the organic food market .
