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The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives

Prior to the 2020 outbreak of COVID-19, 70% of Australians’ food purchases were from supermarkets. Rural communities experience challenges accessing healthy food, which drives health inequalities. This study explores the impact of COVID-19 on food supply and purchasing behaviour in a rural supermark...

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Autores principales: Whelan, Jillian, Brown, Andrew Dwight, Coller, Lee, Strugnell, Claudia, Allender, Steven, Alston, Laura, Hayward, Josh, Brimblecombe, Julie, Bell, Colin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7912204/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33525558
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020417
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author Whelan, Jillian
Brown, Andrew Dwight
Coller, Lee
Strugnell, Claudia
Allender, Steven
Alston, Laura
Hayward, Josh
Brimblecombe, Julie
Bell, Colin
author_facet Whelan, Jillian
Brown, Andrew Dwight
Coller, Lee
Strugnell, Claudia
Allender, Steven
Alston, Laura
Hayward, Josh
Brimblecombe, Julie
Bell, Colin
author_sort Whelan, Jillian
collection PubMed
description Prior to the 2020 outbreak of COVID-19, 70% of Australians’ food purchases were from supermarkets. Rural communities experience challenges accessing healthy food, which drives health inequalities. This study explores the impact of COVID-19 on food supply and purchasing behaviour in a rural supermarket. Group model building workshops explored food supply experiences during COVID-19 in a rural Australian community with one supermarket. We asked three supermarket retailers “What are the current drivers of food supply into this supermarket environment?” and, separately, 33 customers: “What are the current drivers of purchases in this supermarket environment?” Causal loop diagrams were co-created with participants in real time with themes drawn afterwards from coded transcripts. Retailers’ experience of COVID-19 included ‘empty shelves’ attributed to media and government messaging, product unavailability, and community fear. Customers reported fear of contracting COVID-19, unavailability of food, and government restrictions resulting in cooking more meals at home, as influences on purchasing behaviour. Supermarket management and customers demonstrated adaptability and resilience to normalise demand and combat reduced supply.
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spelling pubmed-79122042021-02-28 The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives Whelan, Jillian Brown, Andrew Dwight Coller, Lee Strugnell, Claudia Allender, Steven Alston, Laura Hayward, Josh Brimblecombe, Julie Bell, Colin Nutrients Article Prior to the 2020 outbreak of COVID-19, 70% of Australians’ food purchases were from supermarkets. Rural communities experience challenges accessing healthy food, which drives health inequalities. This study explores the impact of COVID-19 on food supply and purchasing behaviour in a rural supermarket. Group model building workshops explored food supply experiences during COVID-19 in a rural Australian community with one supermarket. We asked three supermarket retailers “What are the current drivers of food supply into this supermarket environment?” and, separately, 33 customers: “What are the current drivers of purchases in this supermarket environment?” Causal loop diagrams were co-created with participants in real time with themes drawn afterwards from coded transcripts. Retailers’ experience of COVID-19 included ‘empty shelves’ attributed to media and government messaging, product unavailability, and community fear. Customers reported fear of contracting COVID-19, unavailability of food, and government restrictions resulting in cooking more meals at home, as influences on purchasing behaviour. Supermarket management and customers demonstrated adaptability and resilience to normalise demand and combat reduced supply. MDPI 2021-01-28 /pmc/articles/PMC7912204/ /pubmed/33525558 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020417 Text en © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Whelan, Jillian
Brown, Andrew Dwight
Coller, Lee
Strugnell, Claudia
Allender, Steven
Alston, Laura
Hayward, Josh
Brimblecombe, Julie
Bell, Colin
The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title_full The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title_fullStr The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title_full_unstemmed The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title_short The Impact of COVID-19 on Rural Food Supply and Demand in Australia: Utilising Group Model Building to Identify Retailer and Customer Perspectives
title_sort impact of covid-19 on rural food supply and demand in australia: utilising group model building to identify retailer and customer perspectives
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7912204/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33525558
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu13020417
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