Assessing Korean Consumers’ Valuation for Domestic and Imported Rice: Importance of Country of Origin and Food Miles Information

The aim of this paper is to determine Korean consumers’ valuation for domestic rice and imported rice from China and the US. Using revealed preference data from random nth price auction mechanism, our results generally suggest that consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for domestic rice is higher than the WTP for imported rice. Results also suggest that while country of origin and food miles information positively influences consumers’ WTP for domestic rice, country of origin information provides higher valuation for domestic rice than food miles information. Country of origin and food miles information has no statistically significant effect on WTP for the imported Chinese rice product but food miles information has a negative effect on WTP for the imported US rice product. Implications of the findings for rice industries for Korea, the US and China are discussed.