Consumer demand for branded and packaged processed foods: comparison of selected rural and urban areas in Tanzania

This study intended to explore the demand for packaged and branded processed food products in selected urban and rural towns of Tanzania. Two urban cities (Morogoro and Dodoma) and four rural towns (Turiani, Matombo, Hombolo and Msaga) were chosen whereby the sample size of 630 respondents was randomly selected. Garrett’s ranking technique, Logistic Regression Model, Multinomial Logistic Model and Kruskal Wallis Test were used to asses consumer’s purchasing habits and drivers of consumer choices. Results showed that there were variations and some similarities in consumers’ habits in rural and urban areas, in small and big towns on; nature of processed food bought, buying places, specific type of product preferred and the most influencing drivers for the preferred product. Furthermore, the study revealed that a majority of the consumers in urban areas were driven by “quantity” as they bought in large volumes of packaged maize flour while the rural consumers were influenced by “storage” when they bought large volumes of packaged maize flour. While “large volume” was the most important factor influencing urban consumers at the purchase of packaged edible oil, “safety” was the most important attribute for rural consumers. In addition, the study showed that consumers from both rural towns and urban cities prefer branded maize flour and branded cooking oils due to their preference for “good sensory test”. Majorly, from the findings study draws two recommendations; (i) There is a need for governmental influence through its regulatory bodies to enforce selling of packaged and branded processed food as a measure of ensuring information symmetry between the manufacturer and consumer, (ii) Manufacturers of processed foods need to devise new and innovative marketing strategies on packaging and branding for further penetration to rural markets.African Economic Research Consortium (AERC