Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
to ensure coverage of as many aspects that we can on the culinary tourist's
journey, and hopefully inspire the reader to think outside of the box.
Consumer Awareness of Food Tourism
In the 1970s the consumer became more aware of the different types of food
available and the quality of food they were consuming. Prior to this most
consumers relied on the local supermarket or grocery store, which in turn,
in order to survive, evolved into out-of-town food halls. At the same time
though, another movement started; the development of farmers' markets
and farm retail experiences. This in turn was followed by a surge in food
programmes on TV and the arrival of the celebrity chefs who today, in many
countries, are as popular as rock stars.
In 1945 the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
set up World Food Day
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on
16
October each year. The original aim was
to help develop further interest in food origins and bring attention to the
food dilemma in third-world countries. Each year the event has a different
theme and becomes more recognized as an important date in the calendar.
Although originally focused on preventing starvation, over the years the day
has developed to have a wider appeal and includes sustainability and the ori-
gins of food.
More and more consumers are now wanting to know not only where
their food is coming from, they want to visit the source and experience new
foods as they travel. Plus they want to experiment personally in new ways of
adding value to food. As a result more small businesses are getting involved
in food tourism. For example, in France there are over 246 varieties of cheese
being produced and in the UK over 700 varieties of cheese.
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The Global Cheese Awards (
www.globalcheeseawards.com
)
are held in
Somerset in the UK. In 2013 they voted for a Canadian cheese as the best
cheese in the world; this was a creamy-gouda style Lankaaster cheese from
Ontario created by Margaret Peters.
In 2010 the International Culinary Tourism Association joined forces
with the New Zealand-based International Culinary Tourism Development
to produce the 'State of the Culinary Tourism Industry Report'.
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This iden-
tified the most prepared regions of the world for culinary tourism. The top
three in order of ranking were Scotland, Louisiana, and Ontario. The least
prepared, but the one with the most potential, was South Africa. Peru had
its own Facebook page to develop the market in that country, the only one
to have done so (
www.facebook.com/perumuchogusto
).
Key Drivers of Culinary Tourism - A Consumer Perspective
From a consumer's perspective the drivers are wide and varied, but can be
summarized as follows.
