Building Ontario Food Brands in China

Our research

Background:

China is the largest food importer in world, Chinese consumers seek quality, safety, and variety. E-commerce allows foreign agriculture companies to enter the Chinese market, but it is a very competitive space. Cross-border e-commerce platforms such as TMall Global and Taobao.com are convenient for foreign companies to enter the market. A perfect opportunity for Canadian companies to increase their presence in the ever-growing Chinese market. 

Canada is competing with other food exporting countries and regions including EU, the U.S, New Zealand, Australia, and Brazil to name a few. In order to win Chinese customers over, it is extremely important that Canadian agricultural products differentiate themselves from their foreign competitors.

Our Goal:

Our study aims to understand how Chinese consumers purchase imported food and how they think of Canada and its agricultural products. We expect the study results can help Canadian agricultural and food producers to better market their products on the Chinese market. This study will identify and test the effects of different country-of-origin dimensions, consumers’ perception of Canadian and Ontario agricultural products along with their purchase intentions.


Our Research & Results:

We have completed three studied of Chinese consumers' purchase of imported food and how they think of Canadian food products. Please click on each of the studies below to find out the interesting results. 


The studies

In-depth interviews with 50 Chinese consumers from top tier cities. 

Country-Of-Origin Effect: What do Chinese consumers think of Canadian and Ontario food products?


What kind of product description works better for Chinese consumers? Do they prefer more emotional message or more rational message?

Questions or inquiries?

Please contact Ying.Jiang@ontariotechu.ca for more information on the project.