4 countries join forces to promote organic

The Netherlands joins forces with Sweden, Finland and Belgium to stimulate the sale of organic products. The countries jointly launch a campaign aimed at the buying behaviour of consumers. By means of nudging, subtle adjustments in the supermarket and online environment, the sale of organic products is stimulated. This is necessary, given the European Commission's action plan for an agricultural area that is at least 25% organic by 2030. A challenge for the Netherlands, with an agricultural area of 4.6% and an organic market share of 3.3%. In addition to increasing the organic market share, the campaign must also contribute to increasing awareness of and confidence in the European organic label.

Sales of organic products

Although Sweden is a leader in selling organic products, they also face the same problems: a relatively small group of consumers (9.5%) is responsible for the biggest share of organic sales (63.5%). In addition, price is a major barrier in all four European countries. Organic products are perceived as expensive by consumers. Despite this, consumers say they want to buy organic.

Food choices

Every day, we make more than 200 food choices that are strongly influenced by our environment. Nudges" are subtle adjustments to that environment in order to stimulate desired behaviour. Research shows that almost half of the consumers would be happy if supermarkets would promote organic products more actively (Future of Foods Institute, 2022). Previous pilots have shown that even small changes on the shop floor can lead to a huge difference in the sale of organic products.

Stimulating the demand side

The campaign is aimed at stimulating the demand side, so that organic farmers are more certain of their sales. Bionext emphasises the importance of balanced growth of both the demand and supply side, given the ambition of the European Commission to use a quarter of the European agricultural area for organic agriculture by 2030. An enormous challenge for many European countries. For this reason, the European Commission has made a subsidy available to stimulate the local organic market for three years through a campaign.

Bionext.nl