Institutional Preconditions of Direct Sales of Food Products in Poland

Abstract

Thanks to legislative changes introduced in the period 2016–2017, Polish farmers have gained an opportunity of selling processed and unprocessed food products directly to customers. The short food supply chains exist and are quite popular in many European Union Member States and they contribute to the development of national food brands. They also play a role in supporting the fostering of sustainable development by providing income to farmers, good quality products to consumers and by bringing people closer to one another. This in turn reinforces social capital by engagement of public institutions in the promotion of the local area, and by supporting communication between the urban and rural areas. Last but not least, as European research suggests, such actions spread the production of organic crops and reduce carbon footprint. The main aim of this paper is to diagnose the determinants of direct food sales on the Polish market, to identify potential obstacles and suggest a development strategy. An additional objective is to define direct sales in the context of sustainable development assumptions as well as review best practices and methods in this field based on an overview of academic literature and case studies. The diagnosis of the conditions was carried out by using SWOT/TOWS tool. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats were identified based on the results of focus group interviews. As a result, some examples of the actions to support direct sales under a competitive strategy have been proposed. The identified potential obstacles to the development of direct sales in terms of supply include a limited number of farmers involved and low level of their social capital. As for the obstacles in terms of demand, the main problems include price sensitivity and consumers’ shopping habits.