Functional Foods and Natural Health Products Survey

Detailed information for 2007

The objectives of the survey are to produce statistical information on the functional food and natural health product sector and a profile of firms engaged in functional food and/or natural health product related activities in Canada.

Data release - January 15, 2009 (preliminary data); July 27, 2009 (additional data)

• Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)
• Description
• Data sources and methodology
• Data accuracy

Description

The objectives of the survey are to produce statistical information on the functional food and natural health product sector and a profile of firms engaged in functional food and/or natural health product related activities in Canada. Information from this survey may be used by businesses for economic or market analysis, by trade associations to study industry performance, by government departments and agencies to assist policy formation, and by the academic community for research purposes.

Subjects

• Biotechnology
• Food, beverage and tobacco
• Manufacturing
• Science and technology

Data sources and methodology

Target population

All firms participating in functional food and/or natural health product related activities (for the purpose of human consumption) in Canada, as identified by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, and firms that indicated they were involved in such activities in the 2007 Survey on Emerging Technologies. The establishment of an enterprise located in the same province where grouped to form the statistical unit. Excluded from the survey were not-for-profit organizations, associations, alliances, unions, universities, government agencies, departments and commissions.

Instrument design

The questionnaire was prepared in active co-operation with partners and in consultation with a group of functional food and natural health product experts offering a range of expertise and interests. Following the initial design work, the questionnaire was field-tested with potential respondents, whose comments on the design and content were incorporated into the final version.

Sampling

This is a sample survey with a cross-sectional design.

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada provided the Science, Innovation and Electronic Information Division with a list of firms involved in functional food and nutraceutical related activities. The Science, Innovation and Electronic Information Division of Statistics Canada also provided a list of companies that had indicated they were involved in functional food and/or nutraceutical related activities in the 2005 Survey on Emerging Technologies. These two lists were merged and duplicate units were identified.

Data sources

Data collection for this reference period: 2008-04-25 to 2008-07-31

Responding to this survey is mandatory.

Data are collected directly from survey respondents.

Data were collected using a paper mail-out, mail-back questionnaire. Pre-contact was made by telephone prior to the mail-out. Follow-up was also conducted by telephone.

View the Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s) .

Error detection

Questionnaires were manually edited and outliers detected as they were received during collection. A series of edit rules were developed and invalid or inconsistent entries were corrected using these rules. Follow-up was conducted for missing entries that could not be manually edited.

Imputation

Hot deck imputation was used to impute qualitative questions. It was also used, combined with ratios, to impute some quantitative questions. Thus, a donor was randomly selected within a receiver's imputation group when required. Imputation groups were based on question 1a), 2a) and 3a) that had seven possible values: functional foods only, natural health products only, services only, functional foods and natural health products, functional foods and services, natural health products and services, and functional foods, natural health products and services.

Donor imputation was also used to impute quantitative questions. A donor is found based on a distance between it and the receiver. The donor with the smallest distance is selected. This is called the nearest neighbour method.

Estimation

All tables were produced with the Generalized Estimation System (GES). Totals and proportions were estimated.

Quality evaluation

Data quality was evaluated on the basis of the quality standards in force at Statistics Canada, namely the standards for data relevance, accuracy, timeliness, accessibility and interpretability. Data quality was evaluated in co-operation with methodologists. In the event of poor quality, the data concerned are not published.

Disclosure control

Statistics Canada is prohibited by law from releasing any information it collects that could identify any person, business, or organization, unless consent has been given by the respondent or as permitted by the Statistics Act. Various confidentiality rules are applied to all data that are released or published to prevent the publication or disclosure of any information deemed confidential. If necessary, data are suppressed to prevent direct or residual disclosure of identifiable data.

In order to prevent any data disclosure, confidentiality analysis is done using the Statistics Canada Generalized Disclosure Control System (G-Confid). G-Confid is used for primary suppression (direct disclosure) as well as for secondary suppression (residual disclosure). Direct disclosure occurs when the value in a tabulation cell is composed of or dominated by few enterprises while residual disclosure occurs when confidential information can be derived indirectly by piecing together information from different sources or data series.

Revisions and seasonal adjustment

This methodology does not apply to this survey.

Data accuracy

The data accuracy indicators used for the Functional Foods and Natural Health Products Survey are the standard error and the coefficient of variation.

The standard error is a commonly used statistical measure indicating the sampling error of an estimate. The standard error and the coefficient of variation (standard error expressed as a percentage of the estimate) were used in statistical tables to provide an indication of the data quality level of the estimates. Please note that the coefficient of variation (CV) was not calculated for percentage tables.

The results were weighted to reflect the entire count of firms in the selected industries. Estimates were vetted for compliance with confidentiality rules. Data quality was assessed in consultation with the methodology team, and when the data were unreliable, they were not published.

The response rate for this survey was 80%.