Will Consumers Pay for Voluntary Testing for BSE? Double-Bound CVM Evidence from Canada

The 2003 discovery of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE)-infected cattle in North America led to efforts to ensure the safety of beef produced in that region, and to some discussion regarding testing live cattle for the BSE prion. This article investigates consumer acceptance and valuation of beef from live cattle that have been voluntarily tested for BSE. Using data from an Internet-based survey of Canadians, double-bound estimates of willingness-to-pay (WTP) are measured. Consumption behaviour and perception covariates were significant predictors of expected WTP, while socio-economic and demographic effects had no measurable impact. Expected WTP was not statistically significant, but ranged from 8% for respondents with a high-purchase intention to -3.5% for those with low/moderate-purchase intention. Further analysis on subsamples of the data showed expected WTP ranges from -5% to 5% for those with low/moderate-purchase intention and from 5% to 22% for those with a high-purchase intension.