Understanding Nutrient - Contaminant Tradeoffs in fish consumer preferences: Evidence from Kenya
通过肯尼亚维多利亚湖地区的选择实验，研究消费者如何应对同时标注营养益处和污染物风险的鱼类产品标签，发现双重标签可共同发挥作用，但可能加剧弱势群体的不健康消费。
Fish consumers are often challenged by tradeoffs between nutritional benefits and contaminant risks, which increase due to environmental pollution. Health campaigns and labeling initiatives can guide decision-making by providing information both on contaminant risk and nutritional value of a product, but it is not well understood how consumers react to such complex dual labels. We use data from a stated choice experiment in Kenya’s Lake Victoria region to study how consumers respond to dual labels on fish products, and how their responses to each label interact. We focus on the tradeoff between polyunsaturated fatty acids and contamination with microcystins, a class of toxins produced by harmful algae blooms that can accumulate in fish tissue. Our findings suggest that, faced with a dual information policy, consumers react rationally to dual health attribute labeling, and that nutrient labels and contaminant warnings can function concurrently, indeed even be mutually reinforcing, but pose a risk of inadvertently concentrating unhealthful consumption in less responsive subpopulations.