Version 1
: Received: 13 August 2024 / Approved: 14 August 2024 / Online: 14 August 2024 (12:47:06 CEST)
How to cite:
Morosan, E.; Dărăban, A. M.; Popovici, V.; Rusu, A.; Ilie, E. I.; Licu, M.; Karampelas, O.; Lupuliasa, D.; Ozon, E. A.; Maravela, V.-M.; Popescu, I. A. Socio-Demographic Factors, Behaviors, Motivations, and Attitudes in Food Waste Management of Romanian Households. Preprints2024, 2024081074. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202408.1074.v1
Morosan, E.; Dărăban, A. M.; Popovici, V.; Rusu, A.; Ilie, E. I.; Licu, M.; Karampelas, O.; Lupuliasa, D.; Ozon, E. A.; Maravela, V.-M.; Popescu, I. A. Socio-Demographic Factors, Behaviors, Motivations, and Attitudes in Food Waste Management of Romanian Households. Preprints 2024, 2024081074. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202408.1074.v1
Morosan, E.; Dărăban, A. M.; Popovici, V.; Rusu, A.; Ilie, E. I.; Licu, M.; Karampelas, O.; Lupuliasa, D.; Ozon, E. A.; Maravela, V.-M.; Popescu, I. A. Socio-Demographic Factors, Behaviors, Motivations, and Attitudes in Food Waste Management of Romanian Households. Preprints2024, 2024081074. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202408.1074.v1
APA Style
Morosan, E., Dărăban, A. M., Popovici, V., Rusu, A., Ilie, E. I., Licu, M., Karampelas, O., Lupuliasa, D., Ozon, E. A., Maravela, V. M., & Popescu, I. A. (2024). Socio-Demographic Factors, Behaviors, Motivations, and Attitudes in Food Waste Management of Romanian Households. Preprints. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202408.1074.v1
Chicago/Turabian Style
Morosan, E., Vanessa-Maria Maravela and Ioana Andreea Popescu. 2024 "Socio-Demographic Factors, Behaviors, Motivations, and Attitudes in Food Waste Management of Romanian Households" Preprints. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202408.1074.v1
Abstract
(1) Background: Food waste (FW) in Romania is 70 Kg/capita/year, while 70% of food waste comes from public catering, retail services, and households (over 50% – 47 million tons). (2) Methods: A cross-sectional observational study was conducted using an online questionnaire via the Google Forms platform from 15 April 2023 to 15 May 2023. The questionnaire was designed to assess various aspects, such as some socio-demographic information (age, sex, occupation, area of residence, study level, household members number, children < 18 years of age); the personal involvement and frequency of food purchases and homemade food cooking; the main sources that generate food waste; the motivation and frequency with which food waste occurs; the level of awareness regarding the impact of food waste; the respondents' intentions regarding sustainable behaviors and practices food management; the level of information and familiarity of the respondents with the notions of validity and how these may influence their food consumption decisions. (3) The results show that FW incidence is occasionally (42%), very rarely (43.33%), frequently (15%), and no food waste was reported by 2.66% of respondents. The [35-44] age category records the highest FW frequency, followed by [18-24]. The most wasted are homemade food (29.67%), bread and bakery products (27.00%), and fruits and vegetables (14.33%). High involvement in purchasing and buying food following a previously established list reduces FW frequency. The same is valid for high daily involvement in food and homemade cooking. High interest in the FW problem and its perception as a waste of money leads to diminishing it, while guilty feelings increase the FW level (37.50% to 73.33%). (4) Conclusions: The present study shows that household food waste management is a multifactorial process that involves numerous socio-demographic, behavioral, and emotional aspects. Extensive data analysis supports our results, revealing deep self-reported information details and confirming its complex approach.
Public Health and Healthcare, Public Health and Health Services
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
