Organic Food Perspective in Developing Countries: An Overview of Polog Region and a Case Study in the Republic of Macedonia

Abstract

Technical and technological advances in food production have brought substantial changes in quantity, quality, diversification and availability of food. The food industry is driven by business activity and objectives, which in turn have considerably affected consumer behavior. While the consumers in general are ready to get adopted and accept the variety of food due to business globalization, thus increasing their preferences to the food that was not available to their vicinity in the past and to the industrial processing such as additives and flavor for extending the duration of consumer durables, a concern has been raised; organic food in a traditional way is healthier. State institutions from their own side have passed many regulations to ensure that food industry and production meets the needed criteria of safety for consumption while businesses compete against each other primarily in making their own way to profit. Yet, an increasing number of consumers worldwide, for their own safety, find it more preferable to undertake a degree of food processing or preparing it on their own. This paper looks at the trend of this consumer behavior in the Polog Region of the Republic of Macedonia, supplemented by a case study of an organic food restaurant located in the city of Tetovo.