Understanding Patterns in the Consumption of Agro-Food Products in Romania - An Analysis at Regional Level

The agro-food sector has faced several challenges since the end of World War II. This article performs an analysis of this sector from the consumer perspective. More precisely, it aims to find certain patterns in the consumption of agro-food products. In this respect, quarterly data with regard to the average consumption of the agro-food products at regional level are used. The data are provided by the Romanian National Institute of Statistics. In order to find patterns in the consumers' behaviour, JDemetra+ version 2.2.2 was used to analyse the time series with regard to seasonal patterns and calendar effects (Trading days, Julian Easter). TRAMO-SEATS and X13 were assessed as seasonal adjustment methods for all series that showed significant seasonality Moreover, only the automatic procedure was used in all cases. The X13 procedure provided the best results in most of the cases.