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Institute of

MA Market Analysis

Project

Focus on School Milk

Lead Institute MA Institute of Market Analysis
© Milchwirtschaftliche Landesvereinigung NRW
Kinder mit Schulmilch

Economic research on the BMEL Project: "Focus on School Milk"

Less and less pupils consume school milk - although school milk products are subsidized. Is the image of milk deterrent? Do not people know about its importance to health or do they disagree? Or is school milk still too expensive? The project "Focus on School Milk" analyses school milk along the supply chain, from the dairy industry to the pupil. The Thünen-Institut of Market Analysis explores, in cooperation with the Max Rubner-Institut reason for the decline in demand and provides advice to improve te system.  

Background and Objective

School milk consumption has declined steadily in Germany. To retrieve quantifiable information on the different influencing factors and to provide approaches to improve the school milk demand, a research project was set up by the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture. The main objective is to evaluate the impact of factors like price; attitudes and habits (especially consumption habits); social background, gender, economic situation; knowledge; product range and distribution form, as well as of nutritional education measures.

Approach

The project consists of a main project and several attached projects. Within the main project, schools located in North Rhine Westphalia were selected by stratified random sampling. The impacts of prices were derived in a price experiment in which the price of school milk was reduced stepwise during the school year 2008/09, and increased over the school year 2009/10, while quantities of demand are reported regularly. Almost all other information/data is captured by questionnaires given to pupils, parents, class teachers, school principals, school milk managers, and delivery firms, with a focus on the consumption of dairy products, attitudes towards school milk and milk in general, acceptance of the school milk program, distribution problems throughout the chain as well as on the handling.

Data and Methods

Data based on the different surveys and panel data of the price experiment were pooled und analysed by different analytical approaches. A special emphasis was put on the application on a multilevel-analysis allowing the joint analysis of data with different structure.

© Milchwirtschaftliche Landesvereinigung NRW
Kinder mit Schulkakao

Results

The free-of-charge distribution of school milk had a high positive impact in the demand decision, confirming the importance of the policy setting (e.g., availability of subsidies). Although the price had an expected negative effect, its impact is limited. In addition to socio-economic factors (e.g., age, gender, immigration background and income of households), the behavior and attitudes of pupils and parents, as well as the context or environment surrounding the school milk offering (e.g., number of school milk products, whether teachers drink milk with the pupils during the break) had an impact.

Links and Downloads

Ergebnisberichte: „Schulmilch im Fokus“ (PDF, 3,52 MB)

Schulmilch - Teilprojekt 4 (PDF, 1,46 MB)

Schulmilch - Teilprojekt 6 (PDF, 992 KB)

Thünen-Contact

Dr. Petra Salamon

MA Institute of Market Analysis

Involved external Thünen-Partners

Publications

  1. 0

    Weible D (2013) Gender-driven food choice: explaining school milk consumption of boys and girls. J Consumer Pol 36(4):403-423, DOI:10.1007/s10603-013-9225-1

  2. 1

    Weible D, Salamon P, Christoph-Schulz IB, Peter G (2013) How do political, individual and contextual factors affect school milk demand? : Empirical evidence from primary schools in Germany. Food Policy 43:148-158, DOI:10.1016/j.foodpol.2013.08.015

  3. 2

    Weible D, Bürgelt D, Christoph IB, Peter G, Salamon P (2012) Economic background of families - is it vital for food decisions? : a case study of school milk orders in Germany ; joint conference of the AAEA and EAAE "food environment: the effect of context on food choice", Boston, May 30-31, 2012 [Poster]. Braunschweig: vTI, 1 p

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dn051350.pdf

  4. 3

    Peter G, Salamon P, Christoph IB, Weible D, Bürgelt D (2012) Eine LOGIT-Analyse zur Differenzierung von Käufern und Nicht-Käufern von Schulmilch in Deutschland. Schr Gesellsch Wirtsch Sozialwiss Landbaues 47:249-260

  5. 4

    Salamon P, Weible D, Bürgelt D, Christoph IB, Peter G (2012) Individual and context factors determine gender-specific behaviour: the case of school milk in Germany : Food environment: the effects of context on food choice ; May 30-31, 2012, Tufts University, Boston, MA. Milwaukee: AAEA, 18 p

  6. 5

    Salamon P, Weible D, Bürgelt D, Christoph IB, Peter G, González Mellado AA, Rothe A, Weber SA (2012) Projekt des BMELV : Ökonomische Begleitforschung zum Bundesmodellvorhaben "Schulmilch im Fokus" ; Endbericht. Braunschweig: Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institut

  7. 6

    Christoph IB, Salamon P, Bürgelt D, Peter G, Weible D, Rothe A, Weber SA (2012) Projekt des BMELV im Rahmen der ökonomischen Begleitforschung zum Bundesmodellvorhaben "Schulmilch im Fokus" : Teilprojekt 4: Akzeptanz und Zahlungsbereitschaft für neue Schulmilchprodukte ; Endbericht. Braunschweig: Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institut, 130 p

  8. 7

    Schmitz J, Salamon P, Bürgelt D, Peter G, Banse M (2012) Projekt des BMELV im Rahmen der ökonomischen Begleitforschung zum Bundesmodellvorhaben "Schulmilch im Fokus" : Teilprojekt 6: Preiselastizität der Milchnachfrage ; Endbericht. Braunschweig: Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institut, 109 p

  9. 8

    Christoph-Schulz IB, Bürgelt D, Peter G, Salamon P, Weible D (2012) The small difference: How does gender affect preferences for school milk? In: Gasiorowska A, Zaleskiewicz T (eds) Microcosm of economic psychology. Warsaw: Warsaw School of Social Sciences and Humanities

  10. 9

    Christoph IB, Bürgelt D, Peter G, Rothe A, Salamon P, Weber SA, Weible D (2011) Children's school milk consumption: How realistic are lexicographic preferences? In: Lea S, Crelley D, Modic D, Butler A, Gordon D (eds) Proceedings of the 2011 Conference of the International Confederation for the Advancement of Behavioural Economics and Economic Psychology. pp 1-14

  11. 10

    Christoph IB, Bürgelt D, Peter G, Rothe A, Salamon P, Weber SA, Weible D (2011) School milk consumption in Germany - which product attributes are important for children and parents? : Poster prepared for presentation at the EAAE 2011 Congress "Change and Uncertainty", August 30 to September 2, Zurich. 1 p

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dn049613.pdf

  12. 11

    Weible D, Bürgelt D, Christoph IB, Peter G, Rothe A, Salamon P, Weber SA (2011) School milk demand in Germany: The role of individual and contextual factors - preliminary results : paper prepared for presentation at the EAAE 2011 Congress "Change and Uncertainty, Challenges for Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources" ; August 30 to September 2, 2011 ; ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland. 15 p

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dn049046.pdf

  13. 12

    González Mellado AA, Christoph IB, Salamon P, Peter G, Weber SA, Weible D (2011) Sinkende Schulmilchnachfrage in Deutschland - woran kann es liegen? Schr Gesellsch Wirtsch Sozialwiss Landbaues 46:47-59

  14. 13

    Christoph IB, Peter G, Rothe A, Salamon P, Weber SA, Weible D (2010) School milk demand - interaction between policy and other factors: some preliminary findings of a regional project : selected paper prepared for presentation at the 1st Joint EAAE/AAEA Seminar "The Economics of Food, Food Choice and Health" ; Freising, Germany, September 15-17, 2010. 16 p

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dn047036.pdf

  15. 14

    Salamon P, Pfau C, Grillenberger M, Christoph IB, Straßburg A, Weber SA, Peter G, González Mellado AA, Bonfig J, Weible D (2010) School milk demand: design and first results of the German federal research project "Focus on school milk". Landbauforsch 60(1):1-10

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/bitv/dk043228.pdf

  16. 15

    González Mellado AA, Christoph IB, Salamon P, Peter G, Weber SA, Weible D (2010) Sinkende Schulmilchnachfrage in Deutschland - Woran kann es liegen? : Vortrag anlässlich der 50. Jahrestagung der GEWISOLA "Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der wissenschaftlichen Politikanalyse" Braunschweig, 29.09. - 01.10.2010 [online]. In: 50. Jahrestagung der GEWISOLA "Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der wissenschaftlichen Politikanalyse", Braunschweig, 29.09. - 01.10.2010. pp 1-13, zu finden in <http://purl.umn.edu/93931> [zitiert am 20.09.2010]

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dn046794.pdf

  17. 16

    Christoph IB, González Mellado AA, Peter G, Salamon P, Weber SA (2009) Driving factors for school milk demand in Germany : Paper prepared for presentation at the 113th EAAE Seminar “A resilient European food industry and food chain in a challenging world”, Chania, Crete, Greece, date as in: September 3 - 6, 2009. 15 p

    https://literatur.thuenen.de/digbib_extern/dk042779.pdf

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