Statistical processing

Source data

Survey population: the major supermarket chains and wholesalers, who sell food to retailers (in total less than 20 data suppliers).

Farm shops and specialized shops are not included. These sales channels covered less than 5 p.c. of the organic turnover in 2020. Source: Økologisk Landsforening ”Økologisk Markedsnotat 2021”, Numbers from Gfk ConsumerScan.

These sales channels can be assumed to have a different composition of the organic turnover than the covered population.

Frequency of data collection

Annual.

Data collection

Data are collected in electronic form (spreadsheet). Questionnaire and guides available at survey site for data suppliers (in Danish)

Data validation

Questionnaires are quality controlled (correlation between value and quantity, developments from previous years) and respondents are recontacted if necessary.

Data compilation

Turnover from wholesalers is recalculated into retail prices, so the reported information is comparable with other reported data from supermarkets and department stores. The following method is applied:

Total turnover from supermarkets and department stores is used to calculate kilo price of individual commodity groups. The amount of sale from from wholesalers is multiplied with the corresponding retail prices. Subsequently the calculated turnover in value terms for individual merchants is compared with the actual turnover, to check if the method is appropriate for all product categories. In case of doubt, the wholesalers have been re-contacted.

The prerequisite to use the turnover in wholesale trade as an estimate for the corresponding turnover in retail is that the retail shops that are members of DSK (plus other small chains/grosers/kiosks), get all or most of their goods from the wholesaler chains. Various experts estimate that this is the case to very large extent.

In few cases, shops that are members of the DSK get milk directly from the dairies bypassing wholesalers. There has not been corrected for this. Sales of dairy products may thus be underestimated a little.

The organic food and beverage share of the total retail sales for food and beverages is from 2017 estimated based on sales figures obtained directly from the companies included in the survey. Up to 2016, the total retail sales of food and beverages were calculated using the study "Retail sales by industry and product group" and an index for the development of retail sales of food and beverages. "Retail sales by industry and product group" is no longer carried out. The new calculation basis is considered to be more accurate than the previous one. The shares from 2017 cannot be compared to previous years. This is partly due to the new calculation basis and partly to the expansion of the survey in 2017 with companies that exclusively sell on-line (including subscription sales).

Adjustment

No corrections of data in addition to what has already been described during data validation and data processing.