Food waste is a problem that is threatening global food security. Nearly-expired food is a major source of food waste in distributional and retail stages. Although its quality and safety are usually guaranteed, compared to normal food, it is less likely to be selected by consumers. Underrepresented literature has paid an effort to explain this phenomenon. This research works on (1) identifying the existence of prejudice against nearly-expired food using a newly-developed concise survey strategy, (2) studying the factors that affect consumer's degree of prejudice; (3) Based on the identification results, this research explores the effectiveness of using traffic-light-colored tags (priming) and quality-safety-information signs (cheap-talk) to promote the selling of NE food by conducting field experiments in chained supermarkets. Based on the findings, this research expects to find a low-cost method for promoting NE food, whereby approaches the goal of food-waste reduction. Furthermore, policy implications will be calling for actions on clarifying and unifying the definition of NE food, as well as standardizing the selling regulations for NE food.
Potential contributions of this research project are as follows:
1. To the best of my knowledge, this is the first research using a behavioral approach to examine the existence of discrimination against NE food. The findings of this research will provide a robustness check of a new flexible behavioral model of discrimination, which gives empirical evidence of its more amplified application.
2. This research will contribute to the literature of applying discrimination and prejudice models to non-human objects.
3. The findings of this research will give empirical evidence of promoting consumers' intention to buy NE food through the channel of alleviating consumers' prejudice against NE food.