Repensar a sustentabilidade da embalagem dos produtos frescos: o caso do consumo de tomate nas grandes superfícies

• Autor(a) principal: Barros, Sara Maria Corgas Duarte
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10451/56793
• topic: Sustentabilidade; Embalagem; Consumo; Comportamentos dos consumidores; Tomate fresco - Caso de estudo; Impacto ambiental; Formação do consumidor; Informação ao consumidor; Domínio/Área Científica::Humanidades::Artes

This research analyses the bulk and pre-packaged consumption of horticultural products in Portuguese supermarkets, focusing on the consumption of fresh tomatoes. The food sector is a service where there is demand, the consumers, and supply, the retailers. In order to build loyalty in this symbiotic relationship, retailers seek to meet the needs of those who seek them, by providing low prices to the so-called "convenience of consumption". To ensure the latter, when it comes to fresh produce, they offer both packaged and bulk options. With this variety of options, consumers have settled for personal convenience, consuming in an unconscious, routine, frictionless way. This pattern has environmental, social, and economic consequences, from packaging waste, lack of transparency from retailers to the disproportion between the real value and the final price presented to consumers, because they pay extra for the packaging that holds the product. To assess the best way to ensure consumers and retailers support the most sustainable options for marketing and transporting tomatoes, exploratory interviews were conducted with two managers of fresh produce from large-scale retailers, and two researchers in the field of food consumption and sustainability. A consumer survey was also conducted. The findings demonstrate that the bulk fresh tomato retail model promotes more sustainable consumption by using several reusable transport options. These options are already offered by some retailers. Sustainably-motivated consumers often choose the option they think is the most sustainable, underestimating their needs and consumption characteristics, ending up having a greater environmental impact. It is recommended the creation of a direct and permanent communicative platform between retailers and consumers, clearly informing them about the cumulative environmental impacts of the various consumption options. However, it is necessary to assume the limits of this model by recalling that retailers' priorities are not yet structurally aligned with the mission of promoting sustainable consumption.