Consumer Demand for Seafood in Taiwan


Consumer Demand for Seafood in Taiwan By Dr. Hwang-Jaw Lee ABSTRACT Consumer demand for food is a critical component in the economic analysis of consumer well-being and food policies. Understanding the structure and pattern of food consumption is essential for designing and assessing food production programs and trade policies. For example, the estimated price and income elasticities of food demand provide important information for assessing the impacts of government price support and income maintenance programs. Other policy areas in which the estimated demand elasticities and projection of consumer demand could be useful include structural analysis and strategic planing by the food industry. The primary objective of this paper is to apply a demand system for analyzing the demand for seafood in Taiwan. The seafood consumption is grouped into four categories, consisting of fish, shrimps & crabs, shell fish, and others. The data on per capita annual seafood availability were obtained from Taiwan Food Balance Sheet. The outline of the paper is as follows: Data sources and data construction are first described. A flexible demand system of the PIGLOG type is specified and demand parameters are estimated. Finally, the key estimated elasticities of four seafood categories are presented. KEYWORDS:consumer demand, seafood, elasticities View Price Analysis and Demand Estimation Session

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