Journal of Business & Economic Management 5(3): 033-045, September 2017 DOI: 10.15413/jbem.2017.0110 ISSN 2315-7755 ©2017 Academia Publishing

Research Paper

Assessing consumer motivation and willingness-to-pay for cabbage treated with bio-pesticides in Togo

Accepted 15th June, 2017 ABSTRACT The growing urbanization of the African cities resulted in a considerable growth of the market demand for vegetable; this was unfortunately met by an intensive use of chemical pesticides that may be harmful to both the producers and consumers’ health and leads to increased environmental pollution problems. To remedy this, alternative methods of production including the use of plant extracts and other bio-pesticides proposed for pest control are currently being tested among vegetables growers, but their widespread use seem to be lagging behind. Hence, the study offers insights on consumer acceptance and willingness to pay for safer vegetables, mainly cabbage. Results show that consumer socioeconomic characteristics are important determinants when expected to be willing to pay a premium for safer vegetable or food products. Results also show that much remains to be provided on the physical differentiation of the two types of vegetables. Key words: Togo, vegetables, bio-pesticides, health risks, consumer perceptions, willingness-to-pay.

INTRODUCTION The rapid growth of urban population that characterizes the current trend of major cities in Sub-Saharan Africa translates into the emergence of megacities; associated with such development food insecurity and unemployment have become increasingly relevant issues. Historically, urban and peri-urban farming viewed as activities without a legal status have become valuable for urban food planning, and their impact on urban economic development is noticeable regarding people dependent on these activities in relation to the four levels of the food system: food production, processing, distribution and consumption. With this evidence of food demand increase in urban areas, the development of urban and peri-urban farming is operated more and more by innovative professionals – single entrepreneur or family businesses whose only quest is to maximize profit or have a good return on their investments.

As current drivers of population growth in African cities cannot be reverted, accessibility, affordability and availability of food are three core aspects of food security

that urban planners must address to meet urban dwellers expectations (Besthorn, 2013; Lang and Barling, 2012). While reconciling the objectives of both the producers and consumers, one may dwell on how operators deal with spatial, ecological, economic and social conditions. Indubitably, the trend confirm the intensive use of chemicals and other unregulated production factors as well as production framework associated with the lack of technical support that may jeopardize the very objective they aim to achieve, that is, food insecurity resulting from the inappropriate use of pesticides or prohibited products.

A survey conducted by the pesticides action network in the country, as part of the international project for the elimination of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), showed the use of pesticides for cotton, including Endosulfan in the field of vegetable farming (Kanda et al., 2013; Glin et al., 2007). Kolke and Kern (2006) confirmed that this practice is widespread in almost all West African countries, where quality control is low. Pesticides used for treating cash crops such as coffee, cocoa and cotton, which

Georges Abbevi Abbey Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology, School of Agriculture, University of Lome, 01 P.O. Box 1515 Lome 01, Togo E-mail: gabbey@univ-lome.tg

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 034 are more persistent and much more toxic are found to also be used on food and vegetables for direct consumption by the population. Other studies revealed that gardening is the area in which the most used pesticides are of poor quality (WHO/Secretariat of the Rotterdam Convention, 2010; Mawois et al., 2011; Ondo et al., 2014).

It follows from these facts that vegetable production or more generally urban vegetable farming is an area that faces important environmental challenges and the negative consequences on producers and consumers’ health are significant. In Togo, more than 500 cases of poisoning in 2009 related to the use of “Endosulfan” were recorded by the Department of Toxicology of the University of Lomé Hospital (Kanda et al., 2009). Many other cases of limited scope failed to be recorded by the communities but the consequences are nonetheless dramatic.

The use botanical extracts or bio-pesticides to control the insect pests of crops is today an alternative to the misuse of chemical pesticides. In recent experiments conducted with gardeners and vegetable producers, extracts from leaves of Azadirachta indica and Carica papaya Linnaeus were tested in the fight against Plutella xylostella, a major pest of cabbage. The effectiveness of these plants’ extracts were compared to a synthetic insecticide, "Conquest more 388 EC", widely used in vegetable farming in Togo. The study shows the efficacy of plant extracts in an integrated pest management (IPM) in vegetable production (Mondedji et al., 2014). But prior to manufacturing such pesticide, a key issue to address must be articulated around the three aspects central to production and consumption decisions: accessibility, availability and affordability (Mondedji et al, 2015; Agboyi et al., 2015).

Since the demand for a farm input is essentially a derived demand, consumer preference remains the core concern of any marketing organization or vegetable growers. Hence, one must analyze the consumer buying behavior both in terms of the specific attributes he or she attaches importance to. With a better understanding of consumers’ perception, one can determine the required actions, that is, the development of integrated pest management tools to suggest to vegetables growers in order to meet consumers’ needs.

The study uses the subject of food safety to assess consumer motivation and willingness to pay for safer vegetables treated with biochemical prepared from vegetable extracts locally known to have repellant properties against some crops’ pests. LITERATURE REVIEW Status of pesticides and uses bio-pesticides use in Togo While the organic movement is gaining momentum in the country under the impetus of regional and international

apex bodies, organic farming doesn’t seem to take off and where it emerged, the targeted niche is often a foreign market, which in itself poses the very problem of real consciousness of local population towards the risks and side-effects associated with the use of manufactured chemicals – insecticides and pesticides in the presence of a very lax legislation.

The presence of biochemical products in the market is mainly the result of agri-input distributors’ curiosity or desire to diversify their offers to farmers and vegetable growers. The alert echoed by the West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research (WECARD) spurred since 2005 some research as well as awareness and training activities geared at garden farmers to demonstrate the effectiveness of bio-pesticides in controlling pests in vegetable production throughout the country. National research institutions and many NGO were involved in the evaluation of approved pesticides and reducing the risks associated with the handling of POPs in the country.

Indeed, cabbage and many other vegetables are damaged by insect pests that have become resistant to a wide range of synthetic insecticides (Roush, 1997; Kranthi et al., 2001; Mondedji et al., 2015). Faced with this situation, vegetable growers increase the frequency of applications and the dosage of applied insecticides, thus causing health and environmental problems (Ripley et al., 2000; Macharia et al., 2005; Galt, 2007; Damalos et al., 2008; Armah, 2011). The main problem identified are (i) the source of supply in these pesticides, almost 90% coming from neighboring countries supplying much of the banned chemicals to the local market (Ghana, Benin and Nigeria), (ii) the inappropriate application of fertilizers and phytosanitary products, (iii) the non-observance of the time of remanence, (iv) the lack of organization of vegetable growers, and (v) the weak infrastructure of the pest control agency.

Mindful of the problem of P. xylostella resistance to several classes of synthetic insecticides, some producers use botanical pesticides such as derivative products of neem or papaya trees (Ulrichs et al., 2001; Peveling and Ely, 2006; Ali et al., 2012; Mondedji et al., 2016).

Other studies have been conducted recently on the potential of some plant oil extracts, namely Cymbopogon schoennthus (Adjrah et al., 2012) and Ocimum canum (Akantetou et al., 2011). Nonetheless, evidence shows that the organic pesticides market is still at its infancy and the proportion of organic pesticides sold versus chemical pesticides hardly reached 0.25% (Montesinos, 2003; Stoytcheva, 2011). Consumer acceptance and willingness to pay for safer vegetables Numerous works have sought to assess the valuation of environmental characteristics by consumers. A first category evaluates the consumer willingness to pay for

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 035 products without pesticides. These studies were mainly focused on the perception of risk associated with the use of pesticides in agriculture; primary data collection and contingent valuation methods were used to conduct such assessment. Among the authors, Misra et al. (1991) sought to identify the determinants of willingness to pay for fresh produce without pesticides in Georgia. It appears from their analysis a positive correlation between the consumers’ perception of deteriorating health impact and the price that they are willing to pay for products without pesticides. Moreover, despite the fact that consumers are receptive to products without pesticides, they are not willing to pay a premium of over 10% for these products. On the same line, Eom (1994) analyzed the consumer preferences vis–à-vis the health risk and the inherent presence of pesticide residues. The author incorporates the perception of consumers risk in a discrete choice model and concluded that the preference for healthy products is partly dependent on the price differential (between conventional and healthy products) and the perception of risks related to pesticides. As a follow up to studies conducted by Hammitt (1990, 1993), Fu et al. (1999), Cranfield and Magnusson (2003), Magnusson and Cranfield (2005) found similar results with survey data in Canada and Taiwan. Altogether, it is also clear that consumers aware of health risks have a higher willingness to pay for products without pesticides. They also show that the premium granted to products without pesticides varies with different levels of risk reduction proposed.

From the review of literature conducted by Florax et al. (2005) on the willingness to pay to reduce risks from pesticides, they found that the results are very heterogeneous. Such variability is explained in part by the diversity of methods used. These authors point that the number of works on the subject is still insufficient to remove the robustness of the results derived from such analysis. Further investigations offer an opportunity for comparing the various multivariate classification methods; they particularly show that the nature of the risk linked to the use of pesticides defined in the different studies impact on the estimates. Other works placed emphasis on the enhancement of environmental characteristics through certification using the contingent valuation method to determine the willingness to pay for eco-labeled products (Gil et al., 2000; Bishop et al., 2015). The analysis shows that household size and concern for safety impact on the probability to buy one or the other product. Thus, the probability for buying products decreases with household size.

With the rise of experimental economy since the 60s, a number of experimental studies propose to analyze the willingness to pay for products that respect the environment. Hence, revealed preference-based protocols have been developed specifying rules for a mechanism of specific bid. In a seminal work, an experiment was conducted by Melton et al. (1996) with conventional and alternative bags of apples, two of which contained apples

produced with no particular widespread pesticides but were treated with neuro-sensitive chemicals. The other two alternative bags contained apples that produced without any neuro-active pesticides, but producers may have used other type of conventional pesticides. The information drawn from the exercise suggests that the willingness to pay for products without neuro pesticides is significantly higher than for the conventional product, and aesthetic damage on apples have a significant negative effect on the consent to pay. Many other applications of experimental auctions are provided to assess several food marketing issues, notably, the use of insecticide (Roosen et al., 1998), irradiation of meat (Shogren et al., 1999), the grading for tenderness, the use of different types of feed (Alfnes et al., 2006; Yue and Tong, 2011), the use of antibiotics in feed (Lusk, Norwood and Pruitt, 2006), and more recent experimental studies focus attention on consumer WTP for environmental characteristics (Bazoche et al., 2008, Wu et al., 2013). Other studies reveal that organic and environment friendly products have always higher ratings than the standard product, but the revelation of the information is of no impact on estimate of the standard product (Bougherara, 2003; Rozan et al., 2003; Hu et al., 2011). They also show that product labeling is of significance especially when linked to health, but the disclosure of information on health risks has not led to specific valuation of labeled products but caused a loss of valuation for the conventional products.

Steenkamp (1997), Verbeke (2000), Griffith and Nesheim (2008) in their consumer behavior models for food provide a categorization of factors influencing the consumer decision making process into 3 types: environmental factors, sociodemographic characteristics of the consumer (demography, psychological and biological) and physical properties of the food. Thus, the marketing stimuli and the socioeconomic environment are what make up the consumer environment. Several studies confirm the role of socioeconomic determinants (income, age, education level, etc.) in the explanation of the WTP (Gildas and Bonnieux, 2003; Hu et al., 2011; Armah, 2011; Yang et al., 2012; Videgbena et al., 2015). According to these authors, the integration of psychological variables (risk perception, voluntary risk exposure) is used to improve the quality of predictions provided by the models and to inform on the attitude of individuals facing a health risk situation. Logically, people who are not exposed to health risk express lower WTP, as well as those with misperception of risk associated with the consumption of processed vegetables with chemical pesticides.

In view of these various studies, it appears reasonable to categorize predictors of consumer WTP for healthy vegetables into 3 categories: (i) socioeconomic and sociodemographic factors (gender, age, marital status, household size, education level, main activity of the household head, etc.); (ii) psychological factors (consumer voluntary exposure, consumer perception of risks related to the consumption of vegetables treated with chemical

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 036 pesticides, etc.); and (iii) factors related to the characteristics of the vegetable (color, size, appearance, etc.). METHODOLOGY Study area The current study was conducted among consumers located in the two southern administrative regions of the country – Maritime and Plateau regions which present the following characteristics: the major cabbage producing zones and also comprise the three major urban centers of the country (Lome, Kpalime and Atakpame). Togo is a country bordered by the republic Benin to the East, Ghana to the West, Burkina Faso to the North and by the Atlantic Ocean in the South. Covering 56,600 square kilometers, the country is divided in five administrative zones: maritime or coastal, Plateau, Central, Kara and Savannah regions representing grossly five agro-ecological zones. Data collection and research areas The study survey was mainly conducted in the selected regions, as they basically concentrated most of the transactional aspects of bio-pesticide experiments on vegetable production in the country. These targeted regions represent 54 and 35% of total area cultivated in commercial vegetables for the Maritime and Plateau region respectively; they also account respectively for 66 and 24% of vegetable produced nationwide (Kouvonou, 1998). A total of 210 questionnaires were administered and 203 were selected from consumers randomly selected and who confirm frequency of vegetable purchase, namely cabbage, the focus of bio-pesticide experiments. The consumers comprise members of households as well as socioeconomic professionals. These latter include hotels and restaurants, street food vendors and vegetable distributors. Theoretical foundation and empirical model Analysis of the change in utility for consumers induced by a change in quality and the level of payment associated with these qualities is based on McFadden’s random utility models, which assume utility is comprised of both a deterministic component stated by the consumer or can be observed by the consumers actions or choices he or she made, and a random unobservable component.

The consumer generally faces a two-fold choice decision; this comprises the specific good to choose and how much to consume of the chosen good. Consumer willingness to pay a premium for a particular good is considered as a

choice problem that could be assessed within the framework of consumer-stated or revealed preference. The consumer-stated method assesses the value of non-market goods by using individuals’ stated behavior in a hypothetical setting, while revealed preference, on the other hand, assesses the value of non-market goods by using the actual or revealed behavior on a closely related market.

Considering the subject at hand, a rational consumer is assumed to choose a bundle of low chemical or organic pesticide-based products (γ1) at a higher price if and only if he or she derives a higher utility from this bundle than from conventional cheaper vegetable (γ0). In other words, the consumer is willing to pay a premium for a given food product, here the safer (low chemical level or bio-pesticide-based) products, if the expected utility of consuming this product E (Ω(γ1)) is positive and exceeds the expected utility of consuming the conventional food products E(Ω(γ0)).

Consumer willingness to pay a premium for safer food product is specified as a function of the change in utility arising from the consumer choice depicted by the following equation WTP = h[Ω(γ)], where Ω(γ) is the change in utility and h’>0. Notably, the consumer chooses the safer vegetable product (γ1) over the conventional one (γ0) if the change in utility is positive [Ω (γ) = Ω (γ1)-Ω (γ0)>0] for all γ1≠γ0.

Since the utility of the consumer is not observable, what is observed is whether or not he or she chooses to pay a premium for the vegetable products treated with plant extract-based pesticides. To analyze this consumer choice, the study opted for a payment card approach, inspired by several studies to measure respondent WTP for both public goods and food products, with special care taken not to induce biases in evaluating WTP estimates, since the number of values offered in a payment cards survey could be limited or beyond the boundaries of consumers’ preferences (Mitchell and Carson, 1989; Brox, Kumar and Stollery, 2003; Hu et al., 2011).

Based on the cost of producing cabbage using conventional pesticide application and knowing the average price of cabbage in the local markets, that is about 200 CFA Franc, respondents were sensitized on the health risks associated to the presence of pesticide residues in crops and garden products. Finally, each respondent was asked during the interview to state how much were he or she willing to pay for the same cabbage without chemical residues. Consequently, a payment card was elicited from the respondents’ responses, which amount to the following distribution (Table 1).

Indeed the payment card WTP elicitation as Hu et al. (2011) pointed out, was initially developed by Mitchell and Carson (1989) to address survey bias in evaluating WTP toward public environmental and resource projects. Bearing that the approach used offers the respondent an option to indicate that he or she doesn’t wish to pay any positive premium for the safer product, this situation may

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 037

Table 1. Distribution of consumers WTP price premium for safer cabbage.

Price premium threshold for bio-pesticide-based vegetable (cabbage = γ1) Price equivalent

(in CFA Franc)

US $ equivalent

($1 = XOF 500)

Conventional cabbage (γ0) average market price P(γ0) = 200 P(γ0) = 0.40

WTP 1% price premium(*) P(γ1) 200 P(γ1) 0.40

WTP 2% to 50% premium P(γ1) 300 P(γ1) 0.60

WTP 51% to 100% premium 300 < P(γ1) 400 0.60 < P(γ1) 0.80

WTP > 100% premium P(γ1) > 400 P(γ1) > 0.80

(*) WTP 1% price premium is the same as the price of the conventional vegetable product treated with chemical pesticides; as such it reflects the unwillingness of the respondent to any additional premium for the safer product. Source: author’s calculation.

have, in our context, several underpinning reasons which should also be examined.

Considering the indirect utility associated with each individual making a choice of a cabbage product type, the model can be written as:

Equation above provides the maximum utility level that can be achieved given the price and income level of the respondent, alongside the socio-economic characteristics, the psychological factors and characteristics of the conventional vegetable included in the equation. The hypothetical health quality improvement the low level chemical or the bio-pesticide causes, is reflected in an increase in the level of utility that reaches V1, all things being equal, such that: Ω (γ) = V (p, Y0, Q1, e, s, c) = V1 with V1 ≥ V0; Where Q0 and Q1 represent the state of nature of the conventional vegetable (treated with chemical pesticides) and the safer vegetable respectively; s describes the sociodemographic and socioeconomic characteristics of the respondent (age, gender, household size, marital status, main source of income, level of education and main activity of the head of household), e the psychological factors (voluntary exposure, perception of risk level associated with chemically treated vegetable, level of information), c indicating characteristics of the vegetable (appearance, color and size). Empirical estimation The dependent variable (WTP) being continuous by nature using a linear model, the choice of LOGIT may be justified in this current situation, as respondents responses were categorized into three groups, namely consumers that are willing to pay a bit more for healthy vegetable and those who wish to nearly double the current price of conventional product and lastly consumers who are not

ready to allocate any premium to acquire healthier or much safer garden products, namely cabbage.

The choice variable indicating the WTP is observed in interval ranges and as such is used to indicate respondents’ discrete choices of intervals, given the vector of explanatory variables. Consequently a conventional ordered logit model can be estimated. The estimation of parameters for the categorical dependent variable is done using the maximum likelihood method, which implies that resulting probabilities of success in the observed data are the maximum likelihood estimates of the conditional probabilities of success given the observed values of predictors (Gujarati and Porter, 2009). It generates and S-shaped curve in the normal distribution and its advantage over the other functions is that the parameters estimated under the logistic regression are fully efficient. Statistical tests, respectively the pseudo - R2 of McFadden and the likelihood ratio, conducted on the categorical response variable (WTP) reveal that the logistic regression model is good and globally statistically sound. The empirical model can be written as follows

, where y* is the true latent (unobserved) WTP known only to the respondents, X is the vector of variables affecting the WTP (described earlier), values of βi are unknown coefficients to be estimated, and ε is the error term normally distributed with mean zero and variance of 1. If a respondent’s unobserved WTP (y*) falls within a predetermined range, its value is assigned a numerical value that reflects the category within which lies their unobserved WTP. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Survey results were produced, which show first the sample statistical characteristics. Results were a little bias toward female representing 75% of consumers surveyed, mainly because survey were undertaken in situ during shopping by consumers. Major marketing sites for garden and farm vegetable products are open market places by nature (no supermarket involved) predominantly visited by women. Unlike the production stage, the distinctiveness of

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 038 marketing of garden vegetables is the exclusive control of women.

The sample is mainly composed of married people with a household size between 4 and 8 followed by households headed by unmarried. Table 2 provides the summary statistics on the consumers who participated in the survey. Standard of living and willingness to pay The variable "standard of living", one explanatory variable to consumer WTP was built from the combination of two variables that are the head of household’s main activity and household size with a negative weight to household size and a positive index the more the activity of the head of household reflects higher income earnings. The first was used to determine the level of head of household income and the second being a determinant of poverty. According to the Poverty reduction strategy paper (PRSP) drafted by the government of Togo, poverty affects more large family size households and the last country census (INSEED-TOGO, 2014) revealed more than 90% of poor households of at least ten people against only 24.5% in households of three people at most. Willingness to pay estimates Consumers targeted in both regions of the southern part of the country are seen to have a mean WTP of CFAF 264.00, leading to a confidence interval of [255; 272] at 95%. The majority of consumers (56%) are willing to pay a price premium in order to get a cabbage previously bought à 200 CFAF once this produce has undergone no conventional pesticides treatment and about 39% of consumers surveyed are willing to pay a price premium exceeding 50% of the baseline price (i.e. premium > CFAF 300). These results are summarized in Table 3. Respondents’ awareness about chemical pesticides use in garden vegetable production The results show that 70% of respondents knew about chemical pesticides being used as inputs in garden vegetable farming; 66% of them have an idea about the advantages and drawbacks in the use of such chemicals in food production, the remaining buyers (34%) acknowledged having no clue whatsoever on inputs or pesticides used in vegetable farming. Table 2 results also show that most respondents (61%) conceded to know that vegetables contain chemical residues and 41% even refused in the past to buy some garden produce following information gathered from the media concerning the dangers of pesticide residues. These buyers confirmed knowing the health risks associated with the consumption of vegetable treated with chemical-based

pesticides, acknowledging public awareness programs through local media. 59% of the respondents confirmed been abreast on these issues through various channels.

Survey results show that more than half of consumers in the coastal region, much urbanized, are relatively much aware of the health risks related to the use of conventional pesticides, but are unaware of the widespread use of such chemicals in market gardening farming in the country. Indeed, several media have carried out information about these risks in the past under the impetus of program ran with the support of the Ministry of Environment, but no direct actions were undertaken to curtail the use of such pesticides in vegetable farming. Consequently, one could infer that results vary across households and regions in that the maritime region benefited the most from these awareness campaigns.

Voluntary exposure and buyers’ motivations Of the 61% of buyers surveyed that recognize the existence of health risks associated the consumption of vegetables treated with chemical pesticides, 80% continue to be voluntarily exposed to such risks in that no clear precaution is taken by these individuals whom exhibit indifference due to unavailability of organic or low pesticide-based products in the local markets. Major reasons put forth by respondents for the current state of exposure are summarized in Table 4.

Characteristics of garden produce in consumer purchasing decision Sixty three percent (63%) of consumers are willing to buy healthier or safer cabbage that is less available than the one produced with conventional pesticides. The choice for forty three percent (43%) of the respondents would be governed by the appearance of cabbage. Few consumers (that is, 32%) would make the decision to buy garden produce based on the first concern of chemical residues in the product, which implies that they hold some additional knowledge that enable them to test for the presence of chemical residues when buying the vegetable.

Estimation of the econometric model and analysis of results Three categories of predictors are seen to influence consumers’ willingness to pay for healthier vegetable or cabbage. These predictors concern (i) the role of sociodemographic characteristics of the respondent, (ii) psychological predisposition of the consumer, and (iii) effect of the vegetable characteristics. The regression results of the Logit model are summarized in Table 5.

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 039 Table 2. Sample statistical characteristics.

Variable Description of variable Criteria and coding in included in the model

Criterion Frequency (%)

WTP Willingness-to-pay Discrete variable

WTP of 1% premium 89 44

WTP 2% to 50% premium 35 17

WTP 51% to 100% premium 79 39

WTP above 100% premium 0 0

Gender Respondent’s gender Discrete variable; 1 for male, 0 otherwise

Male 50 25

Female 153 75

Age Age of respondent Continuous variable; year of age

[15, 25] 17 9

[25, 35] 80 40

[35, 45] 53 26

[45, 55] 42 21

[55, 65] 9 5

Education level Respondent’s level of education Continuous variable, year of education

No literacy 10 5

Literacy 2 1

Primary 40 20

Secondary 94 46

University 56 28

Marital status Respondent’s marital status Discrete variable; 1 for married, 0 otherwise

Married 114 56

Divorced/Widowed 20 10

Single 69 34

Household size Number of people in one household depending on the head of household

Small if HHSIZE 3; Small 83 41

Average if 3< HHSIZE ≥ 7; Average 100 49

Large if HHSIZE >7 Large 20 10

Income Respondent’s monthly income bracket in CFA Franc

Income 50,000 per month; Income between 50,000 and 100,000; and Income > 100,000.

R50,000 85 42

50,000<R100,000 110 54

R> 100,000 8 4

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 040 Table Contd: Sample statistical characteristics

Living standard Quality of family life Combination of income bracket and household size

R50,000 and HHSIZE >7 6 3

R50,000 and 3>HHSIZE<7 31 15

R50,000 and HHSIZE3 49 24

50,000<R100,000 and HHSIZE>7 12 6

50,000<R100,000 and 3<HHSIZE7 63 31

50,000<R100,000 and HHSIZE3 32 16

R > 100,000 and HHSIZE >7 2 1

R > 100,000 and 3<HHSIZE7 4 2

R > 100,000 HHSIZE3 4 2

Pesticide use knowledge Information on use of chemical pesticides as input in vegetable production

1 for pesticide use awareness, 0 otherwise

Yes 143 70

No 60 30

Chemical residues in conventional vegetable

Acknowledgment of vegetable being treated with conventional pesticides contain chemical residues

1 for Yes; 0 otherwise Yes 133 66

No 70 34

Knowledge of health risk linked to pesticides residues in vegetable

Level of information related to health risks related to consumption of chemical pesticide-based vegetable produce

1 for Yes, 0 otherwise Yes 123 61

No 80 39

Information dissemination

Level information disseminated on the presence of chemical residues in conventional vegetable produced by gardeners

Yes 119 59

No 84 41

Voluntary Exposure consumer voluntary exposure by consuming chemical pesticide-based cabbage

1 for Yes; 0 otherwise Yes 86 42

No 117 58

Appearance Vegetable appearance Purchasing decision governed by appearance of vegetable

Yes 87 43

No 116 57

Availability Vegetable availability in market Purchasing decision governed by availability of bio-pesticide vegetable on market

Yes 128 63

No 75 37

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Table 3. Estimated mean willingness to pay for cabbage in Togo.

Average Standard deviation [95% Confidence Interval]

WTP 264.1484 3.70806 256.8318 271.4649

Table 4. Distribution of major drivers of voluntary exposure to health risks.

Major reasons for voluntary exposure Frequency %

Indifference 91 44.66

Non availability of organic products 37 18.46

Intermediaries/vegetable retailers guided by consumer demand 22 10.76

Other or non-specified reasons 53 26.15

Total 203 100.00

Role of socioeconomic characteristics in the consumer purchasing decision The ordered logistic regression shows that the explanatory variable such as "marital status of the head of household" and household living standard have a significant influence on the willingness to pay at 5 and 10% significance level, respectively. Though age, gender and education level have anticipated signs, they don’t seem to affect significantly consumer WTP.

Considering the status of the head of household, it is shown that households headed by married people and those headed by divorcees are five times less likely to have a WTP higher than single people who are three times more likely to have higher WTP. Again, according to the PRSP drawn for the country, households headed by a divorced person (23.4% poverty rate) or separated coupled are more prone to poverty than those households headed by a single person (poverty occurrence equals to 12.6%). Members of households in the first category are less likely to pay an additional premium for healthy vegetables than the others. Moreover, these households would be more concerned about food availability than food quality.

With regard to the consumer living standard, the higher the standard of living the higher is the consumer willing to pay a price premium for the health quality vegetables he or she consumes. This result is consistent with those of Durand (2009) who experimented a contingent valuation method to assess innovations in the field of information and communication technologies for valuing services that could serve to create whole opportunities and application of RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) library. The author shows that variables linked to the social status of the interviewees have a significant influence on their willingness to pay and individuals who claim to have a monthly income above five thousands euros (R>5000 Euros) were 3 times more inclined to help finance the RFID project than individuals who do not belong to this class. Such trends linked to households’ living standard are corroborated by Gildas and Bonnieux (2003) in their

attempt to estimate foot-fishermen WTP for public health safety of foot-fishing by the revelation of the additional distance that they would agree to go in the event of deterioration of the health quality of their usual fishing site. Their results clearly show that the income effect is characterized by a threshold at which and beyond there is no significant relationship between the WTP and income but below it is likely to affect positively WTP. Effect of consumer psychological inclinations on WTP The recognition of the existence of actual or perceived risks associated with the consumption of vegetables and the level of information concerning the presence of chemical residues in vegetables have a significant influence on the WTP at the 1% significance level, the first affecting positively WTP while the second impact negatively consumer consent to pay. This last result confirms the influence of the "awareness of chemical residue in vegetable" variable on consumers’ willingness to pay for vegetable untreated with chemical pesticide. The voluntary risk exposure and the level of knowledge of chemical pesticides don’t seem to have a significant influence on WTP.

With regard to the level of information, people who know that consuming vegetable treated with chemical pesticides bears some health risks are 8 times more likely to pay a premium than people who do not know it, and people knowing that vegetables treated with conventional pesticides contain chemical residues are 10 times less likely to have a willingness to pay higher than people who do not know it. This result drawn from the information variable ("knowing that the cabbage contains chemical residues"), which negatively affects the willingness to pay is due to the fact that consumer knowledge wouldn’t necessarily translate into measure of associated health risks. Indeed, they know that vegetables contain traces of chemical or pesticides but often in faithful posture may concur that these traces do not generate major health

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 042

Table 5. Regression results of the Logit Model.

Factor affecting willingness-to-pay Parameter estimates Std. Err. P > z

Sociodemographic and socioeconomic factors

Gender 0.80 0.51 0.12

Age -0.30 0.023 0.18

Marital status (reference married)

Divorced -1.73 0.79 0.027**

Widower 0.95 1.18 0.415

Single 0.99 0.53 0.06*

Education level (reference = No schooling)

Literate 38.09 3.26 1.00

Primary -0.74 1.39 0.59

Secondary -0.86 1.34 0.52

University -1.14 1.42 0.43

Standard of living (reference = large size and low income household)

Household low- and medium-sized 2.28 1.12 0.04*

Low-income households and small 2.97 1.16 0.01***

Household unless low-income and large 3.55 1.33 0.01***

less low and medium income households 2.50 1.13 0.03**

Household unless low income and small 1.08 1.14 0.35

Household average income and large 3.14 1.84 0.09*

Household average income and average size 1.03 1.26 0.41

Household average income and small 1.57 1.17 0.18

Psychological factors

Knowledge of benefit and drawback of using chemical pesticides 0.06 0.466 0.88

Knowledge of pesticide residues in vegetables -2.21 0.77 0.004***

Perception of health risks associated with consumption of vegetables treated with chemical pesticides

2.06 0.75 0.006***

Voluntary exposure to risk 0.16 0.15 0.28

Characteristics of vegetable crops

Appearance (physical look) of vegetable 0.37 0.47 0.432

Vegetable availability in the market 1.34 0.49 0.006***

Log Likelihood -109.02

R2 adjusted 0.23

N 203

Significance level: * 10% (p<0.01); ** 5% (p<0.05); *** 1% (p<0.01) consequences, thus would tolerate to some extent the presence of pesticide residues in conventional vegetables, which therefore leads to a relatively low inclination to pay a premium (more expensive) for healthy vegetables.

The recognition by the consumer of the presence of health risks linked to the use of pesticides has a significant positive influence on the likelihood of WTP. Indeed, consumers who are aware of health hazards inherent in the consumption of vegetables treated chemical-based

pesticides have great concern to protect themselves against such risks and therefore are inclined to pay for more expensive and healthier vegetables. Influence of the vegetable characteristics on consumers’ purchasing decision The variable “ready to buy healthy vegetables” is seen to

Journal of Business and Economic Management; Abbey. 043 have a significant positive influence on consumer WTP at 1% significance level. People for whom the product availability is not decisive in the purchasing decision process are four times more likely to have a higher WTP than others. Indeed, for cabbage, the type of consumers that would give little importance to product availability are those are aware of the health benefits and hence would be willing to pay more for the garden product regardless the availability of the vegetable. By contrast, consumers whose demand is directly linked to product availability would have reservations to issue consent to pay much higher price for the product. As for the physical appearance of the vegetable, this variable is shown to have no significant influence on consumer WTP but its coefficient is of positive sign, which is consistent with anticipated sign (Roosen et al., 1998). CONCLUSION The study investigated consumers’ motivation and support to bio or ecological awareness that is gaining momentum in the country over the past ten years. Indeed, consumers’ perception and purchasing behavior towards safer and eco-friendly cabbage in southern Togo would have significant market implications for value-added horticultural products.

Evidence shows that targeted consumers of the Maritime and Plateau regions are willing to pay an additional premium of 50 to 100% to get horticultural products – cabbage not treated with chemical pesticides (safer vegetables). 70% of them are aware that chemical pesticides are used as an input in commercial vegetable production, but only 58% are aware of the presence of traces of these pesticides in vegetables. The survey therefore shows that there is a potential demand for healthy vegetables, especially for cabbage in the targeted areas - Maritime and Plateau regions of Togo. The likelihood test results show some key determinants to the consumer of the willingness to pay for vegetable products free of chemical pesticides. These determinants include the marital status of the head of household, the standard of living, the level of information on the presence of residues in horticultural products, evidence of perceived or known health risks in the consumption of cabbage treated with chemical pesticides, and the importance given by consumers to the availability of the safer products on the market.

For the first, the willingness to pay an even higher premium decreases when moving from the target group of married head of household toward the group headed by a divorced person. Another factor that influences the willingness to pay among the socio-economic factors is the standard of living; a composite variable determined both by the main activity of the head of household and household size, WTP is higher as the standard of living rises. After a certain threshold (income greater than

100,000 CFA Franc with household of size greater than or equal to 8), the standard of living has no significant influence on the willingness to pay.

From the psychological point of view, the consumer is inclined to pay for more expensive healthy vegetable when there is awareness on the health risk associated with the consumption of conventional vegetables or cabbage. From the standpoint of the market, the availability of vegetables is a positive determinant on the purchasing decision and leads to a willingness to pay a premium price. RECOMMENDATIONS

From this evidence, considerable efforts still need to be made at various levels to increase the awareness of the benefits in consuming horticultural products treated with safer chemicals or organic pesticides, as well as the negative impact of consuming vegetables treated with conventional insecticides or pesticides on individuals’ health. The emphasis should be to pursue capacity strengthening activities started with vegetable growers, alongside radio programs and communication campaigns on attributes related to the characteristics and organoleptic features to these "healthy" vegetables. By all means, the Government of Togo should invest in educating its people about the presence of chemical residues in conventional vegetables and the health risks associated with them, through awareness campaigns, mass media and the insertion in school programs, at least at primary school, basic teaching courses on health and environmental risks facing horticulture especially in urban and peri-urban agriculture, among other environmental concerns to be addressed. Horticulture products conceivably without chemical pesticides should go through some labeling to enable consumers to make a distinctive choice as regard his willingness to buy healthier and more expensive produce. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author would like to thank WECARD/CORAF for the financial support to undertake the study, the Laboratory of Applied Entomology of the University of Lomé, mainly Prof. Adolé I. Glitho and the research team from the Lab for assistance with the data collection and agricultural experiments both in station and at the farm field school. To Dr. Djodji K. Adjata, plant virologist my sincere thanks for many helpful comments. Other assistance is gratefully acknowledged. All errors remain the responsibility of the author. REFERENCES Adrah Y, Laba B, Nenonéné AY, Koba K, Poutouli W, Sanda K (2012).

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Cite this article as: Abbey GA (2017). Assessing consumer motivation and willingness-to-pay for cabbage treated with bio-pesticides in Togo. J. Bus. Econ. Manag. 5(3): 033-045. Submit your article at http://www.academiapublishing.org/jbem