Shiyao Wei

The increasing release of carbon in the atmosphere is causing the climate to change negatively. These changes will result in the melting of the glacier, the rising in sea levels and coastal flooding. One industry that has tried to reduce its carbon footprint has been the food industry. One of the ways that the food industry is attempting to minimize their carbon footprint is to reduce the distance between farm to table. Foods that are usually produced by local regional farms are commonly referred to as locally sourced foods. Initially, locally sourced food was initially expected to significantly to not only reduce the distance between farm to table but also to reduce carbon footprint in the production and distribution of the food process. In reality, the production and distribution of locally sourced have managed to decrease the distance between farm-to-table but not the carbon footprint. Thus, more research is needed to understand this discrepancy in order to reduce carbon footprint. The need for such research is based on the rationale that consumers who become aware of the lack of impact carbon footprint will lead to increase pressure for the locally sourced food industries to change their production and distribution practice that decrease carbon footprint. Therefore, the goal of this investigation is to evaluate consumer perceptions related to the farm-to-table and carbon footprint production distribution and consumption of locally sourced food versus mass-produced goods. Using a survey-based approach, consumers will be asked to assess their perceptions related to carbon footprint between mass-produced food and locally sourced food that is considered to be either high or low carbon footprint. The expectation made here is that consumer will associate locally sourced food with not only with a shorter farm-to-table distance, but also, a smaller carbon footprint. The results, discussion implications, limitations, and future research will also be discussed.