diff --git a/app/models/mail_handler.rb b/app/models/mail_handler.rb
index be4b363b1..7f50f3771 100755
--- a/app/models/mail_handler.rb
+++ b/app/models/mail_handler.rb
@@ -447,16 +447,23 @@ class MailHandler < ActionMailer::Base
     end
   end
 
-  # Returns the text/plain part of the email
-  # If not found (eg. HTML-only email), returns the body with tags removed
+  # Returns text content of the email. If the value of
+  # mail_handler_preferred_body_part in configuration.yml is 'html' and the
+  # email has text/html part, it returns Textile or Markdown converted from
+  # text/html part. Otherwise, it returns text/plain part.
   def plain_text_body
     return @plain_text_body unless @plain_text_body.nil?
 
-    # check if we have any plain-text parts with content
-    @plain_text_body = email_parts_to_text(email.all_parts.select {|p| p.mime_type == 'text/plain'}).presence
-
-    # if not, we try to parse the body from the HTML-parts
-    @plain_text_body ||= email_parts_to_text(email.all_parts.select {|p| p.mime_type == 'text/html'}).presence
+    multipart_parse_order =
+      if Redmine::Configuration['mail_handler_preferred_body_part'].to_s.casecmp('html') == 0
+        ['text/html', 'text/plain']
+      else
+        ['text/plain', 'text/html']
+      end
+    multipart_parse_order.each do |mime_type|
+      @plain_text_body ||= email_parts_to_text(email.all_parts.select {|p| p.mime_type == mime_type}).presence
+      return @plain_text_body unless @plain_text_body.nil?
+    end
 
     # If there is still no body found, and there are no mime-parts defined,
     # we use the whole raw mail body
diff --git a/config/configuration.yml.example b/config/configuration.yml.example
index bff4c9740..2ba58a2f6 100644
--- a/config/configuration.yml.example
+++ b/config/configuration.yml.example
@@ -83,6 +83,16 @@ default:
   autologin_cookie_path:
   autologin_cookie_secure:
 
+  # Configuration of email receiving.
+  #
+  # Configures which type of part in a multipart email should be parsed first
+  # when receiving emails if the email has both text/plain and text/html part.
+  # Possible values are 'plain' (default) and 'html'.
+  # Examples:
+  # mail_handler_preferred_body_part: html
+  # mail_handler_preferred_body_part: plain
+  mail_handler_preferred_body_part:
+
   # Configuration of SCM executable command.
   #
   # Absolute path (e.g. /usr/local/bin/hg) or command name (e.g. hg.exe, bzr.exe)
diff --git a/test/unit/mail_handler_test.rb b/test/unit/mail_handler_test.rb
index 9d7fd6d12..5614bda6f 100644
--- a/test/unit/mail_handler_test.rb
+++ b/test/unit/mail_handler_test.rb
@@ -662,6 +662,16 @@ class MailHandlerTest < ActiveSupport::TestCase
     assert_equal '', issue.description
   end
 
+  def test_preferred_body_part_configuration
+    Redmine::Configuration.stubs(:[]).with('mail_handler_preferred_body_part').returns('plain')
+    issue = submit_email('text_and_html_part.eml', :issue => {:project => 'ecookbook'})
+    assert_equal 'The text part.', issue.description
+
+    Redmine::Configuration.stubs(:[]).with('mail_handler_preferred_body_part').returns('html')
+    issue = submit_email('text_and_html_part.eml', :issue => {:project => 'ecookbook'})
+    assert_equal 'The html part.', issue.description
+  end
+
   def test_attachment_text_part_should_be_added_as_issue_attachment
     issue = submit_email('multiple_text_parts.eml', :issue => {:project => 'ecookbook'})
     assert_not_include 'Plain text attachment', issue.description