CONSUMERS’ WILLINGNESS-TO-PAY FOR NEWLY DEVELOPED U.S. FARM-RAISED CONVENIENT CATFISH PRODUCTS: A CONSUMER BASE SURVEY STUDY

Increased u nderstanding  of the factors that influence the U.S. consumers' willingness-to-pay (WTP) are critical as it may likely to help restoring the economic profitability of catfish business. A survey was  conducted at four different states/regional-base programs during 2018-2019 . An ordered probit model was developed to examine the variables influencing consumers' WTP.  Current  results suggest that the  five  newly developed  U.S. farm-raised convenient catfish products such as panko breaded standard catfish strips, panko breaded standard catfish fillet, panko breaded delacata catfish fillet, sriracha marinated delacata catfish and sesame-ginger marinated delacata catfish fillet,  could be  widely accepted by the U.S. consumers. This is evident from the consumers' higher WTP for  all these five products.  The study also  indicated  that 41%, 42%, and 47% participants would like to pay the average price of $3.89/108 g, $3.29/108 g and $2.69/80 g to the panko braded catfish delacata fillet, standard fillet and standard strips products, respectively; while 70% and 69% participants' WTP were $3.19/108g for sriracha and sesame-ginger marinated delacata catfish fillet, respectively.  The  potential  variables found to affect the WTP to these five products include product appearance, eagerness to buy, preference ranking, preferred form of eating, catfish consumption pattern  and certain socio-economic parameters such as gender, education, race, age,  and annual family income (Fig.1). Besides, p articipants belong to certain annual family income group ($15,000-$30,000, $30,001=$60,000 and $ 60,001-$100,000) are willing-to- pay  the  higher  price (>$2.69) to these catfish products. Entrepreneurs can potentially target these consumer segments ( based on income group)  in order to increase their revenue by selling these five  convenient catfish products.