Study of knowledge, attitude and awareness of the information of food labeling among consumers in Tripoli municipality Libya

: Objective : The purpose of this study was to investigate consumers’ awareness of food labels and how this awareness guides their decisions when making purchasing choices of food. Method: This was A cross-sectional survey design was conducted in Tripoli municipality from January to May 2019 . 300 volunteers aged 20- 69 years were asked to complete self-administered questionnaire Outcome measures: Measurementsincluded a self-administered questionnaire that elicited information on social demographic characteristics , Awareness of food labeling information; consumer perception on importance of food labelling ; factors associated with reading or not reading food information. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The Chi-Square test was applied to examine the study data. Result : Among the social demographic characteristics of respondents, results did not reflect any statistically significant difference between sex, age and job with the extent of being informed about food labeling. As well as awareness scores computed showed that respondents who had university degree or equivalent of it 81.5% had high level of awareness on food labelling, while secondary education had low level of awareness on food labelling and 96.3% of employed respondents had high level of awareness on food labelling . In addition, 70% of respondents were checking for expiry dates before purchase of prepackaged foods, as well as 67.3% OF respondents was checking for country of origin, while only 23% was checked for nutrient information.72. 6% of respondents recognized food labelling as very important information with bachelor and diploma degree . With regard to read of food information about 82%, 78.7% of respondent were Unfamiliar with language and in a hurry/time constraints respectively, however, 23.1% of them because of the font size as well as 69.7% of respondent read food label because of low price. Our result shows 77.1% did not have health problem but they were reading read food labelling information before purchasing pre-packaged food items, however, 69% of respondents had health problem and they were reading food labelling information before purchasing. Conclusion : This study has revealed that awareness and use of pre-packaged food labelling information is low among consumers in Tripoli municipality. Findings showed that study respondents had high awareness on food labelling among respondents with university degree . Occupation and education level of respondents were found to be significantly associated with awareness and use of pre-packaged food labelling information. more than three quarters of respondents frequently referred labelling information was the expiry date and 67% was country of origin. Consumers were motivated to read labelling information when the product had low price. It was also revealed that there were circumstances in which consumers did not read food labels because they were in a hurry (time constraints), The study also revealed several difficulties that consumers encounter in reading and using food labelling information including small font sizes, and use of unfamiliar language.