THE THEORY OF CONVENTIONS AS A FRAMEWORK TO ANALYSE PARTICIPATORY GUARANTEE SYSTEMS FOR ORGANIC FOOD

Justification/Motivation In recent years, parallel to the growth of the organic sector, we witnessed an increasing interest in alternative ways to guarantee the integrity and authenticity of organic food. Although the mainstream approach to organic certification is useful for consumers to provide a guarantee about production processes and food quality, it is less accessible to small-scale producers and the poorest consumers especially in developing countries. Groups of smallholders worldwide started implementing alternative approaches to cope with problems associated with third-party certification. These practices are known as Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS). The Participatory Guarantee is based on International Organic Standards issued by IFOAM. It takes place at the community level and involves a wide variety of actors along the supply chain (from producers to consumers). It aims at minimizing bureaucracy and costs employing simple verification procedures and incorporating elements of environmental and social education towards quality improvement for both producers and consumers. PGS models are based on the idea of voluntary quality assurance and a diffused control approach. Currently, they are mostly used in developing countries and in economies in transition. PGS adoption makes organic food affordable even to the poorest consumers by mainly relying upon direct selling and direct trust formation mechanisms, reducing transactions costs and granting a higher share of added value to farmers. Research Problem The PGS approach has been observed empirically but a theoretical framework allowing to interpret this phenomenon has not been identified yet. This framework is necessary to correctly set up empirical research aimed at analyzing the factors determining or hindering its success. The development of participatory guaranteed organic food can be influenced in several ways according, for instance, to the location of the consumers (at a local rural community or non local level) where different level of trust and social control could influence their behaviour. The aim of this study is to provide a conceptual framework for the analysis of PGS, aiming at contributing to the investigation of consumer attitudes towards organic foodstuff guaranteed through PGS. Methods A theoretical framework is built on the basis of an extensive literature review on the Theory of Conventions and the analysis of its application to similar issues. The theory of conventions has been widely adopted in the study of Geographical Indication products but it has not yet been applied to PGS projects. PGS and GI products value creation mechanisms share a broad range of common features, mainly related to the fact that they both deal with credence attributes of high quality foods. Discussion The approach of the Theory of Conventions considers that the control of product quality is guaranteed mainly by solid network arrangements and by developing close relationships based on trust, thus mainly involving a local dimension and socially relevant mechanisms that go beyond a framework of individual preferences analysis. Expected results The analytical framework should allow setting up a empirical model aimed at measuring the factors influencing the consumption of PGS certified organic products at different market locations; it allows identifying a series of variables related to the different conventions able to influence consumer behaviour at different market locations.