Value of Country of Origin Labeling Information for Beef and Pork in the United States

Abstract

Mandatory country of origin labeling (MCOOL) for fresh meats, fish, nuts and perishable food products in the United States was implemented by the USDA on March 16th, 2009. US trading partners such as Canada and Mexico have been strong opponents of MCOOL due to its trade restrictive nature while other opponents argue that MCOOL has not presented any added value to consumers. These controversies have prompted interest in attaining an accurate measure of the value of the information (VOI) provided by MCOOL. Prior MCOOL research has been conducted to determine consumers' willingness to pay (WTP) for meat from a specific country of origin however, no post-MCOOL research has determined consumers' VOI provided by MCOOL. Beef and pork consumers in two Texas grocery stores were recruited to participate in one of two types of economic field experiments involving real food and real money. Data show that, in the context of the experiment, consumers VOI for MCOOL range from 1.37 to 2.26 per meat shopping experience depending on the method used to elicit the values. However a large proportion of consumers (82%) are unaware of the existence of MCOOL. When this fact is coupled with the way MCOOL has actually been implemented by most retailers, the empirical estimates suggest that the value of origin information for beef and pork is about 0.025/lb.