Sustainable Food Production, Consumption, and the Generation of

use a lot of their containers…buying in bulk...and having customers return invoice bags with the
containers”.
Overall, there seems to be awareness of packaging waste on the part of food distributors
in the CRD. Recycling what is possible, re-using boxes and skids, promoting consumer
awareness, and supporting local produce that has limited or no packaging are some of the ways
that store managers in the CRD are achieving packaging waste reduction. Consumers have
options to shop at stores that are more environmentally conscious and aware of food packaging
waste, to participate in home delivery box programs, and to purchase fresh produce from local
farms and markets surrounding the CRD.
3.5 Discussion
The dominant waste reduction strategy for consumers in the CRD is recycling. In
general, consumer awareness concerning recycling was high, with almost every participant
actively recycling, and the majority recycling more than 75 percent of their household waste.
Motivations for recycling are primarily based on environmental concerns, such as landfill space,
and conservation of natural resources. A high percentage of the participants reported that they
purchase products that can be recycled, and over half purchase re-usable containers. Consistent
with research showing that there is a high awareness in general to recycle, primarily due to the
introduction of residential recycling programs, the amount of participants that actively seek
products that can be recycled or made with recyclable products diminishes. Surprisingly, almost
all the respondents reported that they felt recycling was not enough to reduce food packaging
waste yet when asked if they participate in further ecologically conscious behaviours such as
buying recyclables, or using re-usable containers the percentage of participation dropped. It has
been suggested that although recycling has become normative (i.e. commonplace and expected
among persons living in a community), ecologically conscious consumer behaviour is still an
innovative, infrequent behaviour (Ebrero et al., 1999). Furthermore, although the psychological
processes underlying recycling and ecologically conscious consumer behaviour may be similar,
the environmental attitudes that have been found to predict recycling are less likely to be related
to consumption, because that behaviour has not been widely accepted (Ebrero et al., 1999).
Despite inconsistencies in predicting ecologically conscious consumer behaviour, it is
noted that there is a growth and diffusion of green marketing and consumption. In the United
States, the number of green product introductions has grown dramatically from 0.5 percent of all
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