Advancing food availability from forests in China: an empirical study of urban residents’ health consciousness and forest food consumption behavior

IF 4.5 1区农林科学 Q1 FOOD SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

Food Security Pub Date : 2026-07-28 DOI:10.1007/s12571-026-01695-0

Shiyu Liu, Jie Lyu, Yuyin Tang, Junyan Zhang, Ke Chen

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

The global food shortage has threatened the people’s well-being and social stability. Harnessing forests as a food source offers substantial potential to leveraging food availability and human health. Rising health consciousness is driving consumers’ demand for forest foods. Using data from 7,210 individuals in Liaoning Province of China, this paper explores how health consciousness influences urban residents’ consumption behavior of various forest foods. The ordered Logit model estimates show a strong positive association between health consciousness and forest food consumption behavior. Accounting for psychological motivation of determining individual’s intentions, health consciousness indirectly shapes forest food consumption through its impact on healthy consumption attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control based on the well-established theory of planned behavior (TPB). Focusing on consumers’ intention, the willingness to pay (WTP) for forest food is confirmed as a partial mediator in this relationship. Further, considering the chain mechanisms from psychological motivation to WTP, estimation results of a bootstrap chain mediating model suggest that healthy consumption attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, and urban residents’ WTP for forest foods collectively exert a chained mediation effect between health consciousness and their consumption behavior toward forest foods. Given an increased public acceptance, results suggest important policy implications focusing on new proposed policies and market initiatives to boost consumption of forest foods, thereby improving the people’s well-being and ensuring food security.

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推进中国森林食物供给：城市居民健康意识与森林食物消费行为的实证研究

全球粮食短缺已经威胁到人民福祉和社会稳定。利用森林作为食物来源为利用粮食供应和人类健康提供了巨大潜力。健康意识的增强推动了消费者对森林食品的需求。本文利用辽宁省7210人的数据，探讨健康意识对城市居民各种森林食品消费行为的影响。有序Logit模型估计显示健康意识与森林食品消费行为之间存在较强的正相关关系。基于计划行为理论（TPB），健康意识通过对健康消费态度、主观规范和感知行为控制的影响间接塑造了森林食品消费，这是决定个体意向的心理动机。关注消费者的意向，森林食品的支付意愿（WTP）在这一关系中被证实是部分中介。此外，考虑心理动机与森林食品消费意愿的连锁机制，自举链中介模型的估计结果表明，健康消费态度、主观规范、感知行为控制和城市居民森林食品消费意愿共同在健康意识与森林食品消费行为之间发挥连锁中介作用。鉴于公众接受程度的提高，研究结果提出了重要的政策影响，重点是新的拟议政策和市场举措，以促进森林食品的消费，从而改善人民的福祉和确保粮食安全。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Food Security FOOD SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY-

CiteScore

14.00

自引率

6.00%

发文量

审稿时长

>12 weeks

期刊介绍： Food Security is a wide audience, interdisciplinary, international journal dedicated to the procurement, access (economic and physical), and quality of food, in all its dimensions. Scales range from the individual to communities, and to the world food system. We strive to publish high-quality scientific articles, where quality includes, but is not limited to, the quality and clarity of text, and the validity of methods and approaches. Food Security is the initiative of a distinguished international group of scientists from different disciplines who hold a deep concern for the challenge of global food security, together with a vision of the power of shared knowledge as a means of meeting that challenge. To address the challenge of global food security, the journal seeks to address the constraints - physical, biological and socio-economic - which not only limit food production but also the ability of people to access a healthy diet. From this perspective, the journal covers the following areas: Global food needs: the mismatch between population and the ability to provide adequate nutrition Global food potential and global food production Natural constraints to satisfying global food needs: § Climate, climate variability, and climate change § Desertification and flooding § Natural disasters § Soils, soil quality and threats to soils, edaphic and other abiotic constraints to production § Biotic constraints to production, pathogens, pests, and weeds in their effects on sustainable production The sociological contexts of food production, access, quality, and consumption. Nutrition, food quality and food safety. Socio-political factors that impinge on the ability to satisfy global food needs: § Land, agricultural and food policy § International relations and trade § Access to food § Financial policy § Wars and ethnic unrest Research policies and priorities to ensure food security in its various dimensions.