Drivers of consumer attention to mandatory energy-efficiency labels affixed to home appliances: An emerging market perspective Paul Blaise Issock Issock a, * , Mercy Mpinganjira b , Mornay Roberts-Lombard c a University of Johannesburg, Department of Marketing Management, School of Consumer Intelligence and Information Systems, Kingsway Ave, Johannesburg, 2092 South Africa b University of Johannesburg, School of Consumer Intelligence & Information Systems, College of Business and Economics, Kingsway Ave, Johannesburg, 2092 South Africa c University of Johannesburg, Department of Marketing Management, School of Consumer Intelligence and Information Systems, Kingsway Ave, Johannesburg, 2092 South Africa article info Article history: Received 8 February 2018 Received in revised form 28 July 2018 Accepted 28 August 2018 Available online 4 September 2018 Keywords: Energy-efficiency labels Consumer's attention Mandatory labelling scheme Customer trust Signalling theory abstract The implementation of mandatory energy-efficiency on electronic products is one of the strategies used by governments to mitigate the environmental impact of consumption. Yet, studies on mandatory energy-efficiency labels and the pivotal role of consumers' attention to such labels remain limited. Thus, this study examines the key drivers of consumers’ attention to energy-efficiency labels that must by law be affixed to all home appliances sold in South Africa. Based on the signalling theory and the attitude-to- behaviour theory, an integrated model was designed to explore these drivers. Using the data from a survey involving 440 South African home appliance users, the model was tested through the structural equation modelling (SEM) approach. The empirical results indicated that consumers pay attention to energy-efficiency labels when they trust the energy-efficiency credentials of products, and when they intend to purchase energy-efficient appliances. Perceived product price was established as an important marketing signal for improving consumer trust in energy-efficiency labels, while social norms and attitude were confirmed as the most important antecedents of the consumer purchase intention of energy-efficient appliances. The findings provide important insights useful for the development of policy interventions aimed at promoting the use of more environmentally friendly home appliances. © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The overreliance on fossil fuels to generate electricity signifi- cantly affects the South Africa's carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emission (International Energy Agency [IEA], 2016; World Energy Council [WEC], 2016). With an average of 7.7 tonnes of CO 2 emission per capita, South Africa is amongst the highest emitters in Africa (IEA, 2017). To develop a less fossil fuel-dependent society, South Af- rica strives towards reducing its ecological footprint through pro- moting environmentally friendly production and consumption in 2014 (IEA, 2015; WEC, 2016). As part of this initiative, the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) embarked on a mandatory environmental labelling scheme for home appliances 1 (SABS, 2014). Environmental labels are product seals or certifications of envi- ronmental attributes that provide consumers with accurate infor- mation about the environmental performance of products to assist consumers' purchase decisions (Taufique et al., 2017). Energy- efficiency labels are a form of environmental label that provide information about the energy consumption of electronic products. Apart from South Africa, mandatory energy efficiency labelling schemes have been undertaken in several emerging countries, including China (Zhu and Sarkis, 2016), South Korea (Park, 2017) and Brazil (Ritter et al., 2015). These environmental labelling programs have heralded several calls globally for more research aimed at understanding consumers’ decision to purchase environmentally labelled products (Liobikien _ e and Bernatonien _ e, 2017; Prieto-Sandoval et al., 2016). While several researchers have heeded such calls, an important corpus of the literature has focused only on voluntary labelling schemes in which * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: pabloissock@gmail.com (P.B. Issock Issock), mmpinganjira@uj. ac.za (M. Mpinganjira), mornayrl@uj.ac.za (M. Roberts-Lombard). 1 Home appliances involved in this mandatory environmental labelling scheme include washing machines, electric ovens, refrigerators, electric geysers, audio and video equipment, dishwashers and electric lamps. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Cleaner Production journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jclepro https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2018.08.299 0959-6526/© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Journal of Cleaner Production 204 (2018) 672e684