Pushing the Boundaries: Studies on Consumers and Food Demand in the Journal of Agricultural Economics

Abstract

We summarize the development of consumer economics and food demand in the Journal of Agricultural Economics over the past 100 years. Even from an early stage, the role of marketing agricultural products in a thriving agricultural sector was recognized within the works published in the Journal. Early papers focused on the demand for specific commodities and consumer trends more generally. Over time, analyses became more advanced, diving into the development of theory and methods for the estimation of demand systems. While this trend has continued, other topics have come to the forefront, such as consumer demand for food quality and safety, consumer acceptance of novel technologies, the demand for sustainable food products, and the role of nutrition and health in consumer studies. Methods were developed concurrently to address the new challenges that the agricultural sector faced, from secondary data analysis to primary data collection and experimental methods.