Consumers may appreciate how Maple Leaf Foods took responsibility for a listeriosis outbreak last summer, but not all of them are buying the company’s meat products.
According to a survey conducted by two University of Regina researchers in February, 69 percent of respondents thought the company handled product recall well.
However, one-quarter of those who had eaten Maple Leaf products before said they have not bought them since.
“There is a paradox between trust and confidence,” said Sylvain Charlebois, associate dean of the university’s Kenneth Levene Graduate School of Business.
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The bacterial disease outbreak at the company’s Toronto plant was linked to the deaths of at least 20 people across Canada and resulted in a massive food recall.
Charlebois said he was surprised at the level of awareness among those surveyed. He and colleague Lisa Watson found that six months after the incident, more than 90 percent of respondents still remembered it.
“It was very likely that people will remember the incident for a long, long time. It will be an historical event.”
Charlebois compared it to a similar study he did two years ago after an E. coli outbreak in spinach. Six months after that event, awareness was only at 55 percent.
“My sense is that consumers are increasingly becoming concerned about food safety regardless whether or not Maple Leaf has anything to do with it,” he said.
The survey officially considered 571 responses out of more than 900 to capture a representative sample based on gender, age, role in the household and geography. Its margin of error is four percent, 19 times out of 20.
Originally, more than 40 percent of the respondents claimed to have not knowingly purchased or eaten Maple Leaf products since the recall. Charlebois said that seems high, but people may not know they are eating the products because they carry a different brand name or they didn’t eat the products before.
He then broke the results down according to those who had bought Maple Leaf meats before the recall.
The survey also found that only eight percent were aware of the full recall list, 14 percent didn’t know what specific products were recalled and only 25 percent who heard about the recall sought out information.
Charlebois said few people turned to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency for information, which is troubling because the agency is involved in every recall.
Charlebois, who has criticized the CFIA in the past, said it seems the agency isn’t doing its job in terms of protecting the public.
A Maple Leaf spokesperson said the company does not comment on third party studies.
