A survey conducted by IBOPE/Rede Conhecimento Social, at the request of the Observatório do Código Florestal—OCF (Portuguese for Forest Code Observatory), shows that 82 percent of consumers in large Brazilian cities would like the products they purchase to comply with the Forest Code, the main Brazilian environmental law. Also, 60 percent say they would pay a little more for such products.
The survey also shows that, spontaneously, only three in ten consumers know the law by name, but most understand its central devices: forests that protect river banks, called permanent preservation areas (PPAs), and the portion of forest that each rural property must preserve, the legal reserve. Six out of ten are able to relate the code to food production.
“Access to information is the basis for more conscious consumption”, IPAM researcher Laura Braga says. “The more knowledge the person has, the better that person realizes the link between production in the field, the importance of the Forest Code, and better products on the table.”
Six hundred (600) people were surveyed in six Brazilian cities (Brasília, Manaus, Porto Alegre, Recife, Rio de Janeiro, and São Paulo) in the second half of 2017. Also, two meetings for qualitative analysis were conducted in October and January, with representatives from Belém, Belo Horizonte, Brasília, Cuiabá, Curitiba, Florianópolis, Goiânia, São Luís, and Vitória. The confidence level is of 95%, with a margin of error of four percentage points.
“Consumers have been getting more and better informed, and this reflects on the compliance of the Forest Code by the producers”, OCF Executive Secretary Roberta Del Giudice explains. “The market needs to adapt, and companies must ensure that their production chain complies with the legislation. The industry that does not worry about this needs to catch up or; otherwise, it will lose space.”
Of those interviewed, 67% go shopping at least once a week, and 85% say that it is important to know the source of what they consume – the older, the clearer the relationship. Young people are the most sensitive to deforestation as an environmental problem.