Perception and factors affecting the practice of puchasing safe processed food among UMT academic staffs

Abstract

Each year, millions of people worldwide suffered from food-borne diseases and illnesses. Therefore, food-related infection is an important health problem in many countries. The study was conducted in Universiti Malaysia Terengganu (UMT) to determine the perception and purchasing practice of safe processed foods among UMT lecturers. This survey involved 127 UMT lecturers and self administered questionnaires were used to collect the data. The questionnaires were distributed and collected between June-October, 2008. The objective of this study are determining the perception about safe processed food, identifying the criteria used in choosing and purchasing safe processed food, factors affecting consumer purchase of processed food and determining relationships between consumers perception and purchasing practice as well as between demographic factors (age, gender, educational level and income level) and purchasing practice. The result of the study showed that 69 respondents were male (54.3%) and 58 were females (45.7%). Majority of the respondents had Master's degree (66.9%) and 33.1% had PhD. It was discovered that most respondents tend to have positive perception toward food safety and choose safe processed food. It was also discovered that there was a significant difference between the food safety perception about safe processed food and purchasing practice (p < 0.05). Demographics factors including age, gender, educational level and income affected consumer perception toward food safety and practice of purchasing safe processed food. Respondents who have higher income and higher educational level more interested in food safety than respondents who have lower income level and lower education level. In addition, female and younger respondents were more interested in food safety than male and older respondents. The result also showed that the four reasons respondent purchase safe processed food were to avoid food poisoning (61.4 %), responsibility toward family (34.6%), to avoid being cheated by seller (3.1%) and avoid money misspend (0.8%).