Identifying Pro-Environmental Producer Behavior on Food SMEs (Small and Micro Enterprises) in Malang
Rahayu Relawati, Harpowo
Department of Agribusiness, University of Muhammadiyah Malang
Abstract
Background: Pro-environmental producer behavior are increasingly urgent to implement an environmentally friendly industry. Aims: To identify the knowledge, attitudes, religiosity, and behavior of the food SME producers towards the environment. Materials and Methods: The research objects are SMEs of “tempe chips” in Malang City, East Java Province. The descriptive analysis is used to explain the findings of producer behavior related to the environment. Results: The study results show that the majority of producers already have knowledge of raw materials and production processes that are environmentally friendly, but only few of them know about the environmentally friendly product packaging. The producers- attitude supports environmentally friendly production processes, although is still at lower level than religiosity. The environmentally friendly producer behavior has not ideal in raw materials usage, production process, and packaging. They have implemented water and energy saving, but have not been able to avoid plastic packaging usage. Generally, the “tempe chips” SME-s performance are healthy. The majority of them are being increased in terms of production, profits, and sustainability of the production process. A small number of producers are declining in terms of production, profits, and face production discontinuity. Conclusion: Further research needs to analyze the effect of religiosity on the behavior of pro-environment producers. The recommendation given is to socialize the use of environmentally friendly product packaging to sell at a premium price. The premium price products are targeted to the middle to upper consumer segments. If it has been socialized, the use of environmentally friendly packaging is expected to become a general implementation of the food packaging.
Keywords: SME, producer behavior, pro-environment.
Topic: Environmentally Sustainable Agriculture