Consumer concerns about food safety in Australia and Japan

Food safety, always an important issue, has recently gained a higher profile following a number of highly publicised incidents in Australia and overseas. Consumers in Australia and Japan were surveyed to obtain information on a range of issues including food safety. This paper presents the findings of this survey and shows that Japanese consumers tended to score lower on the measure of confidence in food safety, suggesting that they are less confident about the safety of the food they consume than Australian consumers. Other demographic factors that have a significant impact on consumer confidence in both countries are identified.