Zusammenfassung:
The article empirically examines the timing of initial decisions to adopt food safety systems and subsequent decisions to maintain the certification. Survival models are used to evaluate firm-level decisions among seafood processors in the Philippines. Whereas initial certification decisions were influenced mainly by easily obtainable a priori indicators such as output price, scale of production, and association membership, decisions to continue certification were influenced by a larger number of less-visible factors including price differentials across markets and cost structures. Managerial hubris may have played a role in initial certification decisions, but decertification decisions were more informed by realized cost-benefit comparisons. Results highlight tendencies to initially overestimate of benefits and underestimate costs of food safety certifications, resulting in unrealistically optimistic projections and may lead to adverse firm performance.