Organic food market: why did it suffer more than other values-driven spending?
Between 2014 and 2020, France’s organic food market expanded dramatically. Its value multiplied by 2.5, rising from around €5 billion to almost €13 billion a year.
Then food prices rose and households were forced to make new trade-offs. Organic products were hit particularly hard, with the market declining for several years before stabilising in 2023.
In 2024, growth returned at around 2%.
This trajectory raises a question that goes beyond organic food itself. Other discretionary categories culture, leisure and holidays proved more resilient over the same broad period.
Why was organic food, a category strongly associated with consumer values and environmental concerns, one of the first to weaken?
Key figures for France’s organic food market
Key takeaways:
– The market multiplied by 2.5 between 2014 and 2020
– Annual value increased from around €5 billion to nearly €13 billion
– Significant decline from 2021 onwards as food prices increased
– Stabilisation in 2023
– Return to growth of around 2% in 2024
– Organic farmland represents around 10.5% of French agricultural land
Organic food is not pleasure spending it is a premium on a substitutable product
This is the key to understanding the market’s unusual trajectory.
Leisure and cultural spending can remain relatively resilient because they often have no cheaper equivalent that provides exactly the same experience.
If someone gives up a concert, they give up that concert.
There is no conventional version of the same event sitting beside it on the shelf at a lower price.
Organic food is different.
It usually represents a price premium on a product for which a cheaper conventional alternative is immediately available.
A consumer who stops buying organic carrots does not stop buying carrots.
They buy conventional ones.
That substitutability changes the economics of the decision.
Consumers may still care about environmental issues, farming practices or product quality.
But when purchasing power comes under pressure, they can reduce spending without immediately giving up the underlying product.
Organic food was therefore not necessarily rejected because households stopped believing in it.
It may simply have been one of the easiest forms of spending to adjust.
The same substitution mechanism seen from the opposite direction
The same logic can be observed elsewhere in the food market.
Egg sales, for example, continued to rise.
Eggs cost around €0.26 each and are among the most affordable sources of animal protein.
The French egg market grew by 4.7% in 2024.
The two movements reflect the same basic substitution mechanism.
When pressure rises, consumers trade down
Organic products can be replaced by cheaper conventional equivalents.
Consumers also move towards lower-cost ways of meeting the same need
More expensive sources of protein can be replaced by eggs.
Food is therefore a distinctive type of household expenditure.
It cannot simply be postponed.
But its composition is highly flexible.
That makes food very different from leisure expenditure, where the trade-off often concerns format rather than the underlying experience.
What does the 2024 recovery mean?
The return to growth of around 2% in 2024 deserves a cautious interpretation.
First, it suggests that substitution can reverse when financial pressure eases.
Consumers who moved away from organic products may return when their budgets allow them to do so.
That would suggest the previous decline was at least partly financially constrained rather than driven by a fundamental change in values.
But the recovery remains modest.
Growth of 2% after several years of decline does not return the market to its 2020 trajectory.
The rebound is real, but the rapid expansion seen between 2014 and 2020 has not resumed.
There is also an important supply-side issue.
Organic farming represents around 10.5% of French agricultural land.
Much of this production capacity was developed during the years of strong market growth.
When demand contracted, the agricultural system did not instantly shrink with it.
The result is an adjustment problem that extends far beyond supermarket shelves and affects producers as well.
What organic food reveals about household trade-offs
Three broader lessons emerge.
Consumer values and actual purchases are not the same thing
Support for environmental or health-related goals does not automatically translate into the ability to pay a price premium.
The market can decline even when the underlying values remain important.
Substitutability determines how resilient spending is
A category is not protected simply because consumers consider it important or virtuous.
What matters is whether there is a cheaper alternative offering a sufficiently similar outcome.
Household trade-offs can reverse
The 2024 recovery suggests that spending cuts are not always permanent.
When financial pressure eases, consumers can return to categories they previously reduced.
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FAQ – Organic food market in France
Why did France’s organic food market decline after 2020?
Rising food prices forced households to make trade-offs. Organic products often carry a premium over conventional equivalents, making them relatively easy to replace with cheaper alternatives.
Does the decline in organic food mean consumers care less about environmental issues?
Not necessarily. Consumers may still value organic production but have less ability to pay the price premium. The return to growth in 2024 suggests that part of the decline was financially driven.
Why did organic food perform worse than leisure spending?
Because organic products have cheaper substitutes that provide a similar basic function. A conventional food product can replace an organic version, whereas a cultural experience or holiday has no exact lower-cost equivalent.
Is France’s organic food market growing again?
Yes. After stabilising in 2023, the market returned to growth of around 2% in 2024, although it has not returned to its previous growth trajectory.
What share of French agricultural land is organic?
Organic farming accounts for around 10.5% of France’s agricultural land.
Key takeaways
France’s organic food market grew rapidly between 2014 and 2020, increasing from around €5 billion to nearly €13 billion.
Rising food prices then triggered a significant decline before the market stabilised in 2023 and returned to growth of around 2% in 2024.
The explanation lies partly in the nature of the purchase.
Organic food represents a price premium on products for which cheaper conventional alternatives are immediately available.
Consumers can therefore reduce spending without giving up the underlying product.
The decline does not necessarily mean environmental concerns disappeared.
It may instead reflect a reduced ability to pay for those concerns.
The return to growth in 2024 suggests that these household trade-offs can reverse, while the 10.5% share of French agricultural land devoted to organic farming highlights how strongly production capacity had already developed during the market’s expansion.
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